Untitled
LATE MEDIEVAL AND
EARLY RENAISSANCE
NORTHERN EUROPE
FRAMING THE ERA
Rogier van der Weyden and Saint Luke
In the 15th century, Flanders—a region corresponding to what is today Belgium, the Netherlands,
Luxembourg, and part of northern France (MAP 20-1)—enjoyed widespread prosperity. Successful
merchants and craft guilds joined the clergy and royalty in commissioning artists to produce works
for both public and private venues. Especially popular were paintings prepared using the recently perfected medium of oil-based pigments, which soon became the favored painting medium throughout
Europe.
One of the early masters of oil painting was ROGIER VAN DER WEYDEN (ca. 1400-1464) of Tournai
in present-day Belgium. Rogier made Brussels his home in 1435 and soon thereafter painted Saint
Luke Drawing the Virgin (1G. 20-1), probably for the city’s artists’ guild, the Guild of Saint Luke. Luke
was the patron saint of artists because legend said he had painted a portrait of the Virgin Mary (see
“Early Christian Saints,” pages 246-247). Rogier’s subject was therefore perfectly suited for the headquarters of a painters’ guild. It shows Luke (his identifying attribute, the ox, is at the right; see “The
Four Evangelists,” page 331) at work in the kind of private residence that wealthy Flemish merchants
of this era owned. Mary has miraculously appeared before Luke and invited him to paint her portrait
as she nurses her son. The saint begins the process by making a preliminary drawing, the same process
Rogier himself would have used when he began this commission. The painting thus not only honors
Luke but also pays tribute to the profession of painting in Flanders (see “The Artist's Profession in
Flanders,” page 580) by documenting the preparatory work required before artists can begin painting
the figures and setting.
The subject also draws attention to the venerable history of portrait painting. A rare genre during the Middle Ages, portraiture became a major source of income for Flemish artists, and Rogier was
one of the best portrait painters (F1G. 20-12A) in Flanders. In fact, some scholars have suggested that
Rogier’s Saint Luke is a self-portrait, identifying the painter with the first Christian artist and underscoring the holy nature of painting. Saint Luke Drawing the Virgin is also emblematic of 15th-century
Flemish painting in aiming to record every detail of a scene with loving fidelity to optical appearance,
seen here in the rich fabrics, the patterned floor, and the landscape visible through the window. Also
characteristic of Flemish art is the imbuing of many of the painting's details with symbolic significance.
For example, the carved armrest of the Virgin’s bench depicts Adam, Eve, and the serpent, reminding
the viewer that Mary is the new Eve and Christ the new Adam who will redeem humanity from Adam
and Eve's Original Sin.
567
NORTHERN EUROPE
IN THE 15TH CENTURY
As the 15th century opened, Rome and Avignon were still the
official seats of two competing popes (see “The Great Schism,”
page 423), and the Hundred Years’ War (1337-1453) between
France and England still raged. The general European movement
toward centralized royal governments, begun in the 12th century,
continued apace, with a corresponding waning ofeudalism. A rising merchant class, whose success depended on individual effort
and talent instead of inherited nobility, spawned a new economic
system—the early stage of European capitalism. In response to the
financial requirements of trade, new credit and exchange systems
created a network of enterprising European cities. Trade in money
accompanied trade in commodities, and the former financed
industry. Both were in the hands of international banking companies, such as those of Jacques Coeur in Bourges (FIG. 13-31) and the
Medici in Florence (see “The Medici,” page 593). In 1460, Flemish
entrepreneurs established the first international commercial stock
North
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exchange in Antwerp. In fact, the French word for stock market
(bourse) comes from the name of the van der Beurse family of Bruges, the wealthiest city in 15th-century Flanders. _
Art also thrived in northern Europe during this time, under
royal, ducal, church, and private patronage. Two developments in
particular were of special significance: the adoption by Rogier van
der Weyden (r1G. 20-1) and his contemporaries of oil-based pigment as the preferred medium for painting, and the blossoming of
printmaking as a major art form, which followed Johannes Gutenberg’s invention of moveable type and the printing press. These new
media had a dramatic influence on artistic production both north
and south of the Alps.
THE FRENCH DUCAL COURTS
In the 15th century, Flanders was not an independent state but
a region under the control of the duke of Burgundy, the ruler of
the fertile east-central region of France still famous for its wines
(MAP 20-1). Duke Philip the Bold (r. 1363-1404) was one of four
jPO.LAN Des” i i
S$. Adriatic
\ Seq_
MAP 20-1 France, the duchy of Burgundy, and the Holy Roman Empire in 1477.
LATE MEDIEVAL AND EARLY RENAISSANCE NORTHERN EUROPE |
= Claus Sluter carves life-size statues of
biblical figures with portraitlike features,
and Jacques de Baerze and Melchior
Broederlam carve and paint the Retable
de Champmol for Philip the Bold, duke faces of Burgundy = Flemish painters establish portraiture = The Limbourg brothers expand the as a major art form illusionistic capabilities of manuscript = German graphic artists pioneer wood- illumination for Jean, duke of Berry
568
® In Flanders, Robert Campin, Jan van
Eyck, and Rogier van der Weyden use
oil paints to record the exact surface
appearance of objects, fabrics, and
cut printing, making art affordable to
the masses
CHAPTER 20. Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe
= The second generation of Flemish
master painters—Petrus Christus,
Dieric Bouts, and Hugo van der
Goes—continues to use oil paints for = The Late Gothic style lingers in Ger- altarpieces featuring naturalistic representations of religious themes
= In Germany, Johannes Gutenberg
invents moveable type and prints the ® Martin Schongauer becomes the first first Bibles on a letterpress
a in Flanders, Hans Memling specializes
in paintings of the Madonna and Child
and portraits of wealthy merchants
many in the large wood altarpieces
carved by Veit Stoss and Tilman
Riemenschneider
Northern European master of metal
engraving
sons of King John II (r. 1350-1364) of France. In 1369, Philip mar- ried Margaret de Male, the daughter of the count of Flanders, and acquired territory in the Netherlands. Thereafter, the major source of Burgundian wealth was Bruges, the city that made Burgundy a powerful rival of France, which then, as in the Gothic age, was a much smaller kingdom geographically than the modern nation- state. Bruges initially derived its wealth from the wool trade, but
soon expanded into banking, becoming the financial clearinghouse for all of northern Europe. Indeed, Bruges so dominated Flanders that the duke of Burgundy eventually chose to make the city his
capital and moved his court there from Dijon.
Due to the expanded territory and the prosperity of the duchy
of Burgundy, Philip the Bold and his successors were probably the
most powerful northern European rulers during the first three
quarters of the 15th century. Although members of the French
royal family, they usually supported England during the Hundred
Years’ War because they relied on English raw materials for their
wool industry. At times, the dukes of Burgundy controlled much of
northern France, including Paris, the seat of the French monarchy.
At the height of Burgundian power, the ducal lands stretched from
the Rhéne River to the North Sea.
20-2 CLAUS SLUTER, Well of Moses, Chartreuse de Champmol,
Dijon, France, 1396-1406. Asniéres limestone, painted and gilded
by JEAN MALOUEL, Moses 6’ high.
The Well of Moses, a symbolic fountain of life made for the duke of Burgundy, originally supported a sculpted Crucifixion group. Sluter’s figures
recall French Gothic jamb statues, but are far more realistic.
Chartreuse de Champmol
The great wealth the Burgundy court acquired enabled it to become
a significant patron of the arts. Burgundian dukes fully appreciated
that artworks could support their dynastic and political goals as well
as adorn their castles and townhouses. Philip the Bold’s grandest
artistic enterprise was the Chartreuse de Champmol, near Dijon. A
chartreuse (“charter house” in English) is a Carthusian monastery.
The Carthusian order, founded by Saint Bruno (ca. 1030-1101) in
the late 11th century at Chartreuse, near Grenoble in southeastern
France, consisted of monks who devoted their lives to solitary living and prayer. Unlike monastic orders that earned income from
farming and other work, the Carthusians generated no revenues.
Philip's generous endowment at Champmol was therefore the sole
funding for an ambitious artistic program inspired by the French
royal abbey at Saint-Denis (see “Abbot Suger and the Rebuilding of
Saint-Denis,” page 383, and Fic. 13-1), the burial site of the French
kings. The duke’s choice for architect was DROUET DE DAMMARTIN,
who had worked for his brother King Charles V (r. 1364-1380) on
the Louvre (FIG. 20-6), the French royal palace in Paris. In 1372,
Philip appointed as chief sculptor the Netherlandish master Jean
de Marville (d. 1389), who had also worked for Charles V, but at
Rouen Cathedral. Emulating the royal burials at Saint-Denis, Philip
decided to create at the Dijon chartreuse a ducal mausoleum that
would serve both as a means of securing salvation in perpetuity for
the ducal family (the monks prayed continuously for their souls)
and as a dynastic symbol of Burgundian power.
Claus Sluter. In 1389, following the death
of Jean de Marville, Philip placed the Netherlandish sculptor CLAUS SLUTER (ca. 1360-
1406) of Haarlem in charge of the sculptural
program (FIGs. 20-2 and 20-2A). Sluter had
joined the Chartreuse de Champmol sculpture workshop as Jean’s assistant in 1385. For
the portal (FIG. 20-2A) of the monastery’s
chapel, Sluter’s workshop produced statues of the duke and his wife kneeling before
the Virgin and Child. For the cloister, Sluter
designed a large sculptural fountain located
in a well (FIG. 20-2). The well itself served as a
water source for the monastery, but Sluter’s fountain did not spout
water because the Carthusian commitment to silence and prayer
would have precluded anything producing sound.
The Well of Moses features statues of Moses and five other Old
Testament prophets (David, Daniel, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Zachariah)
ringing a base that once supported a 25-foot-tall group of Christ on
the cross mourned by Mary Magdalene, joined perhaps by the Virgin Mary and John the Evangelist. Art historians usually describe the
Well of Moses as a fons vitae, a fountain of everlasting life, in which
the blood of the crucified Christ, symbolized by water, flows down
into a basin, and anyone who drinks from the fountain is redeemed.
Sluter incorporated the symbolism of the fons vitae in his waterless
fountain, in which the viewer must imagine Christ's blood streaming down over grieving angels and the Savior’s prophetic predecessors. Although the models for the Old Testament figures may have
been French Gothic cathedral portal statues, as was certainly the case
for the Dijon chapel statues (F1G. 20-2A), the inspiration for the Well
of Moses prophets may have come more directly from contemporaneous mystery plays in which actors portraying prophets frequently
delivered commentaries on events in Christ’ life.
(4)20-2A Stuter,
Chartreuse de
Champmol portal,
13890-1393.
Every thumbnail image has a corresponding full-size MindTap Bonus Image and content in the MindTap reader for this chapter. 569
The six prophets have almost portraitlike features and distinct
individual personalities and costumes. For example, David is an
elegantly garbed Gothic king and Moses an elderly horned prophet
(compare FIG. 12-38) with a waist-length beard. Sluter intensely
studied the natural appearance of faces and fabrics in order to
sculpt the biblical figures in minute detail. Heavy draperies with
voluminous folds swathe the life-size statues. Sluter succeeded in
making their difficult, complex surfaces seem remarkably naturalistic. He enhanced this effect by skillfully differentiating textures,
from coarse drapery to smooth flesh and silky hair. Paint, much
of which has flaked off, further augmented the naturalism of the
figures. (The painter was JEAN MALOUEL [ca. 1365-1415], another
Netherlandish master.) This fascination with the specific and tangible in the visible world became one of the chief characteristics of
15th-century Flemish art.
Retable de Champmol. Philip the Bold also commissioned a
major altarpiece—the Retable de Champmol (FIGs. 20-3 and 20-4)—
for the main altar in the chapel of the Chartreuse. A collaborative
project between two Flemish artists, this altarpiece consisted of a
RSS NPL SE
ASS SACs BT
Sone e §
20-3 JACQUES DE BAERZE, Retable de Champmol (open), from the chapel of the Chartreuse de Champmol, Dijon, France,
installed 1399. Wood, center section 5’ 5+” x 8’ 34”. Musée des Beaux-Arts, Dijon.
Worshipers could view the interior of the Champmol altarpiece on Sundays and feast days. Jacques de Baerze carved three scenes
of Jesus's life centered on the Crucifixion, a fitting backdrop for the Eucharist.
20-4 MELCHIOR BROEDERLAM,
Retable de Champmol (closed), from
the chapel of the Chartreuse de
Champmol, Dijon, France, installed
1399. Oil and tempera on wood, each
wing 5’ 53" x 4’ 14”. Musée des BeauxArts, Dijon.
This early example of oil painting attempts
to represent the three-dimensional world
on a two-dimensional surface, but the
gold background and flat halos recall
medieval pictorial conventions.
570 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe
large sculptured shrine (r1<. 20-3) by JACQuEs DE BAERZE (active ca. 1384-1399) and a pair of painted exterior panels (FIG. 20-4) by MELCHIOR BROEDERLAM (active ca. 1387-1409).
Altarpieces were a major art form north of the Alps during the late 14th and the 15th century. From their position behind the altar, they served as backdrops for the Mass, the ritual celebration of the Holy Eucharist. At the Last Supper, Christ commanded his apostles to reenact the Eucharistic meal and repeat in memory of him the communion credo, wherein he tenders his body to eat and his blood to drink (see “The Life of Jesus in Art? pages 244-245). This act serves as the nucleus of the Mass, which involves this reenactment as well as prayer and contemplation of the word of God. Because the Mass involves not only a memorial rite but Christian doctrine as well, art has traditionally played an important role in giving visual form
to complex theological concepts for the faithful. Like the narrative
reliefs in medieval church portals, these altarpieces had an important
teaching function, especially for the illiterate. By reinforcing Church
doctrines visually, they also stimulated devotion.
These altarpieces most often took the form of polyptychs—
hinged multipaneled paintings or multiple carved relief panels. The
hinges enabled the clergy to close the polyptych’s side wings over the
central panel(s). Because artists decorated both the exterior and interior of the altarpieces, this multi-image format provided the opportunity to construct narratives through a sequence of images. Although
concrete information is lacking about when the clergy opened and
closed the altarpieces, the wings probably normally remained closed
but were opened on Sundays and feast days. On this schedule, viewers could have seen both the interior and exterior—diverse imagery
at various times according to the liturgical calendar.
Given their placement in churches as backdrops to the Mass,
it is not surprising that among the many kinds of scenes depicted
on altarpieces, themes directly related to Christ’s sacrifice are common. The Champmol altarpiece, or retable, for example, features
sculpted passion scenes on the interior: the Crucifixion (at the center) and (at left and right respectively) the adoration of the magi
and the entombment of Christ, with rows of saints on the wings, all
framed by delicate pinnacles, tracery, and lancets. The carved wood
narratives span the full life cycle of Jesus from his birth to his death
and burial, with the figure of the Savior on the cross forming a fitting backdrop to the Eucharist.
On the Champmol retable’s painted wings (FIG. 20-4), Broederlam depicted the Annunciation and Visitation (on the left panel) and
the presentation in the temple and flight into Egypt (on the right).
Thus Broederlam’ painted images on the altarpiece’s exterior gave a
fuller account of the Savior’s early life and set the stage for de Baerze's
passion scenes when the wings were folded back to reveal the sculpted
narratives. The two painted wings include both landscape and interior scenes. Broederlam depicted the buildings in both Romanesque
and Gothic styles. Scholars have suggested that the juxtaposition of
different architectural styles in the left panel is symbolic. The rotunda
(round building, usually with a dome, a common antique type) refers
to the Old Testament, whereas the “modern” Gothic porch with its
lancet windows and tracery relates to the New Testament. In the right
panel, a statue of a Greco-Roman god falls from the top of a column
as the holy family approaches. These and other details announce the
coming of the new order under Christ.
Stylistically, Broederlam’s panels are a mixture of three-dimensional rendition of the landscape and buildings with a solid gold
background and flat gold haloes for the holy figures, regardless of the
positions of their heads. Despite these lingering medieval pictorial
conventions, the altarpiece is an early example of many of the artistic
developments that preoccupied European artists throughout the 15th
century, especially the illusionistic depiction of three-dimensional
objects and the naturalistic representation of landscape.
Oil Painting. The Retable de Champmol also foreshadowed another significant development in 15th-century art: the widespread
adoption of oil paints, which Broederlam mixed with tempera in
this early example (see “Tempera and Oil Painting? page 574).
Oil paints facilitated the exactitude in rendering details so characteristic of Northern European painting. Although the Italian biographer Giorgio Vasari (see “Giorgio Vasari’ Lives,” page 648) and other
16th-century commentators credited the Flemish master Jan van
Eyck (discussed later in this chapter) with the invention of oil painting, recent evidence has revealed that oil paints had been known for
some time, well before Melchior Broederlam liberally used oils for
Philip the Bold’s Dijon altarpiece. Flemish painters built up their pictures by superimposing translucent paint layers on a layer of underpainting, which in turn had been built up from a carefully planned
drawing (compare Saint Luke at work in Fra. 20-1) made on a panel
prepared with a white ground. With the oil medium, artists could
create richer colors and more subtle gradations of tone than previously possible, giving their paintings the illusion of glowing light and
glistening surfaces. These traits differed significantly from the highkeyed color, sharp light, and rather matte (dull) surface of tempera.
The brilliant and versatile oil medium suited perfectly the formal
intentions of the generation of Flemish painters after Broederlam,
who aimed for sharply focused clarity of detail in their representation
of objects ranging in scale from large to almost invisible.
Manuscript Painting
During the 15th century, Northern European artists built on the
achievements of Gothic painters (see “Gothic Book Production,’
page 402) and produced exquisitely refined illuminated manuscripts. Among the most significant developments in manuscript
painting was a new interest in representing fully modeled figures
moving freely in convincing three-dimensional settings. Increased
contact with Italy, where Renaissance artists had revived the pictorial principles of classical antiquity, may have influenced Northern
painters’ interest in illusionism.
Limbourg Brothers. The most innovative early-15th-century
manuscript illuminators were the three LIMBOURG BROTHERS—POL,
HERMAN, and JEAN—from Nijmegen in the Netherlands. They were
nephews of Jean Malouel, the court artist of Philip the Bold, who
painted Sluter’s Well of Moses statues (FIG. 20-2). Following in the
footsteps of earlier illustrators such as Jean Pucelle (FIGs. 13-36 and
13-36A), the Limbourg brothers expanded the illusionistic capabilities of illumination. Trained in the Netherlands, the brothers moved
to Paris no later than 1402, and between 1405 and their death in 1416
(probably from the plague), they worked in Paris and Bourges for
Jean, duke of Berry (r. 1360-1416) and brother of Philip the Bold of
Burgundy and King Charles V (r. 1364-1380) of France.
Jean ruled the western French regions of Berry, Poitou, and
Auvergne (MAP 20-1). The duke was an avid art patron and focused
on collecting manuscripts, jewels, and rare artifacts. Among the more
than 300 manuscripts he owned were Pucelle’s Belleville Breviary
(Fic. 13-36) and the Hours of Jeanne d’Evreux (FIG. 13-36A) as well as
Les Trés Riches Heures du Duc de Berry (The Very Sumptuous Hours of
the Duke of Berry; F1Gs. 20-5 and 20-6), which he commissioned the
Limbourg brothers to produce. A Book of Hours, like a breviary, was
The French Ducal Courts 571
20-5 LIMBOURG BROTHERS (POL, HERMAN, JEAN), January, from
Les Trés Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, 1413-1416. Colors and ink
on vellum, 82" x 52”. Musée Condé, Chantilly.
The pictures in Les Tres Riches Heures depict characteristic activities of
each month. The prominence of genre subjects reflects the increasing integration of religious and secular art in the 15th century.
a book used for reciting prayers (see “Medieval Books,’ page 324). As
prayer books, they replaced the traditional psalters (books of psalms),
which were the only liturgical books in private hands until the mid13th century. Books of Hours contained liturgical passages to be read
privately at set times during the day, from matins (dawn prayers) to
compline (the last of the prayers recited daily), including the “Office
[prayer] of the Blessed Virgin.” An illustrated calendar containing
local religious feast days usually preceded the Office of the Blessed
Virgin. Penitential psalms, devotional prayers, litanies to the saints,
and other prayers, including those of the Holy Cross and for the
dead, followed. Books of Hours became favorite possessions of the
Northern European aristocracy during the 14th and 15th centuries.
These costly books eventually became available to affluent merchants
and contributed to the decentralization of religious practice that was
one factor in the Protestant Reformation in the early 16th century
(see “Luther and the Reformation; page 692),
The full-page calendar pictures of Les Trés Riches Heures are
the most famous in the history of manuscript illumination. They
20-6 LIMBOURG BROTHERS (POL, HERMAN, JEAN), October, from
Les Trés Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, 1413-1416. Colors and ink
on vellum, 82" x 52", Musée Condé, Chantilly.
The Limbourg brothers were pioneers in expanding the illusionistic capabilities of manuscript painting with their care in rendering architectural details
and their convincing depiction of cast shadows.
represent the 12 months in terms of the associated seasonal tasks,
alternating scenes of nobility and peasantry, and featuring the duke’s
relationship with his courtiers and peasants. Above each picture is
a lunette in which the Limbourgs depicted the zodiac signs and the
chariot of the sun as it makes its yearly cycle through the heavens.
Beyond its function as a religious book, Les Trés Riches Heures also
furnishes a picture of life in the territory the duke ruled—a picture
designed to flatter the Limbourgs’ patron. For example, the colorful calendar picture for January (FIG. 2-5) portrays a New Year’s
reception at court. The duke appears as magnanimous host, his
head circled by the fire screen, almost halolike, behind him. His
chamberlain stands next to him, urging the guests forward with
the words “aproche, aproche,” words that call attention to the Limbourgs’ success in creating the illusion of deep spatial recession.
The lavish spread of food on the table and the large tapestry on the back wall augment the richness of the setting and the occasion.
572 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe
By contrast, the illustration for October (FIG. 20-6) focuses on the peasantry. Here, the Limbourg brothers depicted a sower, a man plowing on horseback, and washerwomen, along with city dwell- ers, who promenade in front of the Louvre, the French king's resi- dence at the time, now one of the world’s great art museums. (Paris was not then the highly populated urban center it is today. Open fields surrounded the royal palace.) The peasants do not appear dis- contented as they go about their various tasks. Surely this imagery
flattered the duke’s sense of himself as a compassionate master. The
growing artistic interest in naturalism is evident here in the careful
way the painter recorded the architectural details of the Louvre and
in the convincing shadows of the people and objects (such as the
archer scarecrow and the horse) in the scene.
As a whole, Les Trés Riches Heures reinforced the image of
the duke of Berry as a devout man, cultured bibliophile (“lover of
books”), sophisticated art patron, and powerful and magnanimous
leader. Further, the expanded range of subject matter, especially
the prominence of genre subjects in a religious book, reflected the
increasing integration of religious and secular concerns in both art
and life during the 15th century.
Although all three Limbourg brothers worked on Les Trés
Riches Heures, art historians have never been able to ascertain
definitively which brother painted which images. (One scholar has
suggested that because the book was left unfinished at the time of
the brothers’ deaths, some of the details are the work of a fourth
artist, who completed the illustrations around the middle of the
century.) Given the common practice of collaboration on artistic
projects at this time, however, the determination of specific authorship is not very important. Together, the Trés Riches Heures illuminators reoriented the art of manuscript illumination to approximate
more closely the art of panel painting, treating the pages of books as
if they were windows onto the world of 15th-century Europe.
Mary of Burgundy. The Limbourgs’ most accomplished successor at the end of the century was an anonymous illuminator
known as the MasTER OF Mary OF BurGunby. Some scholars
identify him as ALEXANDER BENING (ca. 1444-1519) of Ghent, a
painter in the circle of Hugo van der Goes (FIG. 20-16). The two
facing pages illustrated here (FIG. 20-7) are the opening full-page
illumination and one of the daily prayers in the private devotional
Book of Hours that belonged to Mary, the last duchess of Burgundy
(r. 1477-1482) and daughter of Charles the Bold. She is the elegantly
dressed woman sitting in a private chapel with her pet dog on her
lap, reading from a prayer book of the same size and format as the
one in which her portrait appears. On a ledge to her left are her
rosary beads and a tall vase with purple irises—flowers associated
20-7 MASTER OF Mary oF BurGuNDY, Mary of Burgundy at Prayer, folios 14 verso and 15 recto of the Hours of Mary of Burgundy,
‘ 3n ca. 1477. Colors and ink on parchment, illumination on left page 73" x 5”, Osterreichische Nationalbibliothek, Vienna. In this Book of Hours, the page became literally a window onto the world. Mary of Burgundy prays in a private chapel. Seen through a window is the answer to her prayers—an audience with the Virgin. The French Ducal Courts 573 Tempera and Oil Painting The generic words paint and pigment encompass a wide range of substances that artists have used through the ages. Fresco aside (see “Fresco Painting,” page 428), during the 14th century, egg tempera was the material of choice for most painters, both in Italy and northern Europe. Tempera consists of egg combined with a wet paste of ground pigment. In his influential 1487 guidebook /I libro dell’arte (The Handbook of Art; see “Imitation and Emulation in Renaissance Art,” page 606), Cennino Cennini (ca. 1370-ca. 1440) noted that artists mixed only the egg yolk with the ground pigment, but analyses of paintings from this period have revealed that some artists chose to use the entire egg. Images painted with tempera have a velvety sheen. Artists usually applied tempera to the painting surface with a light touch because thick application of the pigment mixture would result in premature cracking and flaking. Some artists used oil paints (powdered pigments mixed with linseed oil) as far back as the eighth century, but not until the early 1400s did oil painting become widespread. Melchior Broederlam (Fic. 20-4), Robert Campin (Fic. 20-8), and other Flemish artists were among the first to employ oils extensively, often mixing them with tempera, as Broederlam did. (Italian painters soon followed suit, underscoring that artistic exchanges across the Alps went in both directions during the Renaissance.) The discovery of better drying components in the early 15th century enhanced the setting capabilities of oils. Rather than apply these oils in the light, flecked brushstrokes that the tempera technique encouraged, artists laid down the oils in transparent layers, or glazes, over opaque or 20-8 ROBERT CAMPIN (MASTER OF FLEMALLE), Mérode Triptych (open), 2’ r43n 13” x 2’ 17” : , ” 7 : 3", each wing 2’ 13” x 102”, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (The Cloisters Collection, 1956) semiopaque underlayers. In this manner, painters could build up deep and subtly gradated tones through repeated glazing. Unlike works in tempera, whose surface dries quickly due to water evaporation, oils dry more uniformly and slowly, giving the artist time to rework areas. This flexibility must have been particularly appealing to artists who worked very deliberately, such as Campin, Jan van Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden, and the other Flemish masters discussed in this chapter, as well as the Italian Leonardo da Vinci (Fries. 22-2 and 22-5). Leonardo also preferred oil paint because its gradual drying process and consistency enabled him to blend the pigments, thereby creating the impressive sfumato (smoky) effect that contributed to his fame. Moreover, while drying, oil paints smooth out, erasing any trace of the brush that applied the paint. Oil paints also produce a glowing surface, creating a rich visual effect unlike the duller sheen of tempera. Both tempera and oils can be applied to various surfaces. Through the early 16th century, wood panels served as the foundation for most paintings. Italians painted on poplar. Northern European artists used oak, lime, beech, chestnut, cherry, pine, and silver fir. Local availability of these timbers determined the choice of wood. Linen canvas became increasingly popular in the late 16th century. Although evidence suggests that artists did not intend permanency for their early images on canvas, the material proved particularly useful in areas such as Venice where high humidity warped wood panels and made fresco unfeasible. Furthermore, until artists began to use wood bars to stretch the canvas to form a taut surface, canvas paintings could be rolled and were lighter and more compact and therefore rnore easily portable than wood panels. ca. 1425-1428. Oil on wood, center panel Campin was the leading painter of Tournai and an early master of oil painting. In the Mérode Triptych, he set the Annunciation in a Flemish merchant’s home in which many objects have symbolic significance. 574 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe with the Virgin Mary. The masterful representation of rich fabrics, Mary's transparent veil, and the still life of flowers all attest to this painter's skill and powers of observation. Even more remarkable is the illuminator’s meticulously detailed depiction of the Gothic church seen through the window of Mary’s chapel, especially because the manuscript page is only half the size of Jan van Eyck’s Madonna in a Church (1G. 20-10A). The scene presented to the viewer through the chapel window within the page's “window onto the world”—a brilliant conception in itself—is the realization of Mary’s prayers. The duchess has been granted a private audience with the Virgin without any interced- ing priest. She, accompanied by her ladies-in-waiting, kneels before the Virgin, who sits in front of the church altar, attended by angels and holding the Christ Child in her lap. Both holy figures turn their heads to look at the duchess. The illumination has few peers in the history of art as an image of pious devotion. FLANDERS As noted, the greatest single source of income for the Burgundian ducal court came from banking and trade activities in Flanders, territory that Philip the Bold acquired when he married the Flemish counts daughter. Flanders was also the leading artistic center of Northern Europe in the 15th century. Master of Flémalle One of the greatest Flemish painters of the generation after Melchior Broederlam was the man known as the MASTER OF FLEMALLE, whom most art historians identify as ROBERT CAMPIN (ca. 1375-1444), the leading painter of Tournai, who also worked in the newly popular medium of oil painting (see “Tempera and Oil Painting,’ page 574). His most famous work is the Mérode Triptych (FIG. 20-8), although it has recently been suggested that the triptych (three-panel painting) is the work of more than one artist and that the wings are a later addition. The question of authorship apart, the painting is one of the many small works of this period produced for private patrons and intended for household prayer. Perhaps the most striking feature of these private devotional images is the integration of religious and secular concerns. For example, artists often presented biblical scenes as taking place in a house (compare FIG. 20-1). Religion was such an integral part of Flemish life that separating the sacred from the secular was almost impossible—and undesirable. Furthermore, the presentation in religious art of familiar settings and objects no doubt strengthened the direct bond that the patron or viewer felt with biblical figures. The Annunciation, prophesied in Isaiah 7:14, is the subject of the central panel of Campin’s triptych. Unseen by the Virgin, a tiny figure of Christ carrying the cross of his martyrdom and of human salvation enters the room on a ray of light, a potent symbol of the Incarnation and a foreshadowing of what lies ahead for the future Mother of God and her son. The archangel Gabriel approaches Mary, who sits reading inside a well-kept Flemish home. Through the window in the background of the right wing, the viewer sees a local cityscape, as in Rogier van der Weyden’s later Saint Luke (FIG. 20-1). The depicted accessories, furniture, and utensils confirm the locale as Flanders. However, the objects represented are not merely decorative. They also function as religious symbols. The book, extinguished candle, and lilies on the table; the copper basin in the corner niche; the towels, fire screen, and bench all symbolize, in different ways, the Virgin’s purity and her divine mission. In the right panel, Joseph, apparently unaware of the angel's arrival, has constructed two mousetraps, symbolic of the theological concept that Christ is bait set in the trap of the world to catch the Devil. The ax, saw, and rod that Campin painted in the foreground of Joseph’s workshop not only are tools of the carpenter’s trade but also are mentioned in Isaiah 10:15. In the left panel, the closed garden is symbolic of Mary’s purity, and the flowers Campin included relate to Mary’s virtues, especially humility. The triptych’s donor, Peter Inghelbrecht, a wealthy merchant, and his wife, Margarete Scrynmakers, kneel in the garden and witness the momentous event through an open door. Donor portraits—portraits of the individual(s) who commissioned (or “donated”) the work— became very popular in the 15th century. In this instance, in addition to asking to be represented in their altarpiece, the Inghelbrechts probably specified the subject. Inghelbrecht means “angel bringer,” a reference to Gabriel’s bringing the news of Christ’s birth to Mary in the central panel. Scrynmakers means “cabinet- or shrine-makers,’ and probably inspired the workshop scene in the right panel. Jan van Eyck In 1425, JAN VAN Eyck (ca. 1395-1441), the most famous of several internationally renowned Flemish artists, became the court painter of Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy (r. 1419-1467). In 1431, he moved his studio to Bruges, where the duke maintained his official residence. Ghent Altarpiece. ‘The year Jan arrived in Bruges, he set out to complete the Ghent Altarpiece (FIGs. 20-9 and 20-10), which, according to the dedicatory inscription, his older brother, HUBERT VAN EYCcK (ca. 1385-1426), had begun. Given Jan’s stature today, it is noteworthy that the inscription describes Hubert as an artist “than whom there was no greater” and Jan as “his brother, second in art.” The nearly 12-foot-tall Ghent retable is one of the largest of the 15th century. Jodocus Vyd (d. 1439), diplomat-retainer of Philip the Good, and his wife, Elisabeth Borluut (d. 1443), commissioned the polyptych as the centerpiece of the chapel Vyd built in the Ghent church originally dedicated to Saint John the Baptist (since 1540, Saint Bavo Cathedral). Vyd’s largesse and the political and social connections that the Ghent Altarpiece revealed to its audience contributed to Vyd’s appointment as the city’s burgomeister (chief magistrate; mayor) shortly after the unveiling of the work. Two of the exterior panels (FIG. 20-9) depict the donors. The husband and wife, in paired niches with Gothic tracery, kneel with their hands clasped in prayer. They gaze piously at two illusionistically rendered statues (painted in grisaille—that is, solely in gray tones to imitate stone) that reflect the innovative style of Claus Sluter (FIGs. 20-2 and 20-2A). The sculptures represent Ghent’s patron saint, John the Baptist, and John the Evangelist, who was probably Vyd’s patron saint. The Annunciation appears on the upper register, with a careful representation of a Flemish town outside the painted window of the center panel (compare FIGs. 20-1 and 20-8). In the uppermost arched panels, Jan depicted the Old Testament prophets Zachariah and Micah, along with sibyls, Greco-Roman mythological female prophets whose writings the Church interpreted as prophecies of Christ. An interesting detail is the exchange of words between Gabriel and the Virgin. Jan painted the words of Mary’s response upside down, because they are directed to God in Heaven. When open (FIG. 20-10), the altarpiece reveals a richly colored painting of human redemption through Christ. In the upper register, God the Father—wearing the pope’ triple tiara, with a worldly Flanders 575 20-9 HUBERT and JAN VAN EyCk, Ghent Altarpiece (closed), Saint Bavo Cathedral, Ghent, Belgium, ca. 1423-1432. Oil on wood, 11’ 5” x 7’ 6”. Grandiose multipanel painted altarpieces were popular in Flemish churches. Artists decorated both the interiors and exteriors of these polyptychs, which often, as here, included donor portraits. Oil 20-10 on wood, HUuBERT and Jan van EYCK, Ghent Altarpiece (open), Saint Bavo Cathedral, Ghent, Belgium, ca. 1423-1432. 11’ 5” x 15’ 1". The In this van richly Eyck colored brothers painting of salvation from the Original Sin of Adam and Eve, God the Father presides in majesty. used oil paints to render every detail with loving fidelity to appearance, 576 CHAPTER T 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe crown at his feet and resplendent in a deep- scarlet mantle—presides in majesty. To God’s right is the Virgin, represented, as in the Gothic age and in a small Jan van Eyck diptych (twopaneled painting; F1G. 20-10A), as the queen of Heaven, with a crown of 12 stars on her head. John the Baptist sits to God’s left. To either side is a choir of angels, with an angel playing an organ on the right. Adam and Eve appear in the far panels. The inscriptions in the arches above Mary and Saint John extol the Virgin's virtue and purity and Saint John’s greatness as the forerunner of Christ (see “Early Christian Saints,” pages 246-247). The inscription above the Lord’s head translates as “This is God, all-powerful in his divine majesty; of all the best, by the gentleness of his goodness; the most liberal giver, because of his infinite 20-10A Van Eyck, Madonna in a Church, ca. 1430-1440. A SECOND OPINION , Giovanni Arnolfini and His Wife In 1484, Jan van Eyck depicted Giovanni Arnolfini, a Lucca financier who had established himself in Bruges as an agent of the Medici family, and his second wife in their home (Fic. 20-11). Arnolfini holds the hand of his spouse, whose name is not known. That much is certain, but the purpose and meaning of the double portrait remain the subject of considerable debate, with a few new interpretations having been advanced just during the last several years. According to the traditional interpretation of the painting, Jan recorded the couple taking their marriage vows. As in the Mérode Triptych (Fic. 20-8), almost every object portrayed carries meaning. For example, the little dog symbolizes fidelity (the common canine name Fido originated from the Latin fidere, “to trust”). The finial (crowning ornament) of the marriage bed at the right is a tiny statue of Saint Margaret, patron saint of childbirth. (The bride is not yet pregnant, although the fashionable costume she wears makes her appear so.) From the finial hangs a whiskbroom, symbolic of domestic care. Indeed, even the placement of the two figures in the room is meaningful. The woman stands near the bed and well into the room, whereas the man stands near the open window, symbolic of the outside world. Many art historians, however, dispute this interpretation because, among other things, the room in which Arnolfini and his wife stand is a public reception area, not a bedchamber. One scholar has suggested that Arnolfini is conferring legal privileges on his wife to conduct business in his absence. Another thinks that this may be a memorial portrait of a wife who died in childbirth. In any case, an important aspect of the painting is that the artist functions as a witness to whatever event is taking place. In the background, framed by the arms and joined hands of the two figures, is a convex mirror (complete with its spatial distortion, brilliantly recorded; compare Fic. 22-40), in which Jan depicted not only the principals, Arnolfini and his wife, but also two persons who look into the room through the door. (Arnolfini’s raised right hand may be a gesture of greeting to the two men.) One of these must be the artist himself, as the elegant inscription above the mirror, Johannes de Eyck fuit hic (“Jan van Eyck was here”), announces that he was present. The self-portrait also underscores the painter’s self-consciousness as a professional artist whose role deserves to be recorded and remembered. generosity.’ The step behind the crown at the Lord’s feet bears the inscription “On his head, life without death. On his brow, youth without age. On his right, joy without sadness. On his left, security without fear” The entire altarpiece amplifies the central theme of salvation. Even though humans, personified by Adam and Eve, are sinful, they will be saved because God, in his infinite love, will sacrifice his own son for their sake. The panels of the lower register extend the symbolism of the upper. In the center panel, saints arrive from the four corners of the earth through an opulent, flower-spangled landscape. They proceed toward the altar of the Lamb and the octagonal fountain of life (compare FIG. 20-2). The book of Revelation passage that recounts the adoration of the Lamb is the main reading on All Saints’ Day (November 1). The Lamb symbolizes the sacrificed son of God, whose heart bleeds into a chalice, while into the fountain spills the “pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb” (Rev. 22:1). On the right, the 20-11 JAN VAN Eyck, Giovanni Arnolfini and His Wife, 1434. Oil on wood, 2’ 9” x 1’ 104". National Gallery, London. Jan van Eyck played a major role in establishing portraiture as an important Flemish art form. In this portrait of an Italian financier and his wife, he also portrayed himself in the convex mirror on the rear wall. Flanders 577 | MATERIALS AND TECHNIQUES Framed Paintings Until the mid-20th century, when painters began to affix canvas to simple wood stretcher bars to provide a taut painting surface devoid of ornamentation, artists considered the frame an integral part of the painting. Frames served a number of functions, some visual, others conceptual. For paintings such as large-scale altarpieces that were part of a larger environment, frames often served to integrate the painting with its surroundings. Frames could also be used to reinforce the illusionistic nature of the painted image. For example, the Italian painter Giovanni Bellini, in his San Zaccaria Altarpiece (ria. 22-29), duplicated the carved pilasters of the architectural frame in the painting itself, thereby enhancing the illusion of space and giving the painted figures an enhanced physical presence. In the Ghent Altarpiece, the frame seems to cast shadows on the floor between the angel and Mary in the Annunciation scene (Fig. 20-9, top). More commonly, artists used frames specifically to distance the viewer from the (often otherworldly) scene by calling attention to the separation of the image from the viewer's space. Most 15th- and 16th-century paintings included elaborate frames that the artists themselves helped design and construct. Extant contracts reveal that the frame could account for as much as half of the cost of an altarpiece. Frequently, the commissions called for painted or gilded frames, adding to the expense. For small works, artists sometimes affixed the frames to the panels before painting, so that the frame was a point of reference as they worked. Occasionally, a single piece of wood served as both panel and frame, and the artist (or, in practice, an assistant) carved the painting surface from the wood, leaving the edges as a frame. Larger images with elaborate frames, such as altarpieces, required the services of a professional woodcarver or stonemason. The painter worked closely with the individual constructing the frame to ensure its appropriateness for the image(s) produced. Unfortunately, over time, many frames have been removed from their paintings. For instance, in 1566 church officials dismantled the Ghent Altarpiece and detached its elaborately carved frame in order to protect the sacred work from Protestant iconoclasts (see “Art and the Reformation,” page 692), As ill luck would have it, when the panels were reinstalled in 1587, no one could find the frame. Sadly, the absence of many of the original frames of old paintings deprives viewers today of the painter’s complete artistic vision. Conversely, when the original frames exist, they sometimes provide essential information, such as the 12 apostles and a group of martyrs in red robes advance. On the left appear prophets. In the right background come the virgin martyrs, and in the left background the holy confessors approach. On the lower wings, hermits, pilgrims, knights, and judges enter from left and right. They symbolize the four cardinal virtues: Temperance, Prudence, Fortitude, and Justice, respectively. The altarpiece celebrates the whole Christian cycle from the fall of man to the redemption, presenting the Church triumphant in heavenly Jerusalem. Jan used oil paints to render the entire altarpiece in shimmering colors that defy reproduction. No small detail escaped the painter. With pristine specificity, he revealed the beauty of the most insignificant object. He depicted the soft texture of hair, the glitter of gold in the heavy brocades, the luster of pearls, and the flashing of gems, all with loving fidelity to appearance. This kind of 20-12 JAN VAN Eyck, Man in a Red Turban, 1433. Oil on wood, 1’ 13” x 104”. National Gallery, London. Man in a Red Turban is the first known Western painted portrait in a thousand years in which the sitter looks directly at the viewer. The inscribed frame suggests that it is a self-portrait of Jan van Eyck. subject, name of the painter, and date. For example, the inscriptions on the frame of Jan van Eyck’s Man in a Red Turban (ric. 20-12) state that he painted it on October 21, 1488, and the inclusion of “As | can” and omission of the sitter’s name suggest that the painting is a self-portrait. meticulous attention to recording details became a hallmark of Flemish panel painting in the 15th century. Giovanni Arnolfini. Emerging capitalism led to prosperity in Europes booming urban centers and fueled in turn the growing bourgeois market for art objects, particularly in Bruges, Antwerp, and, later, Amsterdam. The increased wealth of the merchant class contributed to an expanded market for secular art in addition to religious artworks. It is noteworthy, for example, that both the Mérode Triptych and the Ghent Altarpiece—certainly to be catego- rized as “religious art”—include painted portraits of their donors. These paintings marked a significant revival of portraiture, a genre that had languished since antiquity. Private commissions for por- traits as independent artworks began to multiply as both artists and 578 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe patrons became interested in the reality (both physical and psycho- logical) that portraits could reveal. In the 15th century, Flemish patrons eagerly embraced the opportunity to have their likenesses painted. The elite wanted to memorialize themselves in their dynastic lines and to establish their identities, ranks, and stations with images far more concrete than heraldic coats of arms. Portraits also served to represent state offi- cials at events they could not attend. Royalty, nobility, and the very rich would sometimes send artists to paint the likeness of a pro- spective bride or groom. For example, when young King Charles VI (x. 1380-1422) of France sought a bride, he dispatched a painter to three different royal courts to make portraits of the candidates. But prosperous merchants also commissioned portraits for their homes. An early example of secular portraiture is Jan van Eyck’s difficult-to-interpret depiction of the banker Giovanni Arnolfini (see “Giovanni Arnolfini and His Wife,” page 577). Man in a Red Turban. Whatever the intended meaning of Giovanni Arnolfini and His Wife, the painting is representative of the growing importance of secular portraiture as an incomeproducing artistic genre in 15th-century Flanders. In Man in a Red Turban (Fic. 20-12), the man whom Jan van Eyck portrayed looks directly at the viewer. This is the first known Western painted portrait in a thousand years where the sitter does so. The level, composed gaze, directed from a true three-quarter head pose, must have impressed observers deeply. The painter created the illusion that from whatever angle a viewer observes the face, the eyes return that gaze. Jan, with his considerable observational skill and controlled painting style, injected a heightened sense of specificity into this portrait by including beard stubble, veins in the bloodshot left eye, and weathered, aged skin. Although a definitive identification of the sitter has yet to be made, most art historians consider Man in a Red Turban a self-portrait, which Jan painted by looking at his image in a mirror (as he depicted himself in the mirror in the Arnolfinis home; FIG. 20-11). The inscriptions on the frame (see “Framed Paintings,’ page 578) reinforce this identification. Across the top, Jan wrote “As I can” in Flemish using Greek letters. One suggestion is that this portrait was a demonstration piece intended for prospective clients, who could compare the painting with the painter and judge what he “could do” in terms of recording a faithful likeness. Across the bottom appear the date and a statement in Latin: “Jan van Eyck made me.” The use of both Greek and Latin suggests that the artist viewed himself as both a learned man and a worthy successor to the fabled painters of antiquity. When Jan van Eyck began work on the Ghent Altarpiece, Rogier van der Weyden (IG. 20-1) was an assistant in the workshop of Robert Campin (Fic. 20-8), but the younger Tournai painter’s fame soon eclipsed Campin’s and eventually rivaled Jan's. Rogier’s renown rested on his skill in recording individual features and character in his portraits (FIG. 20-12A) and especially on the dynamic compositions of his narrative works, which stress human action and drama. He concentrated on Christian themes, especially those episodes in the life of Jesus that elicited powerful emotions—for example, the Crucifixion and Pieta (the Virgin Mary cradling the dead body of her son)—moving observers deeply by vividly portraying the sufferings of Christ. (4) 20-12A VaN DER Weyoen, Portrait of a Lady, ca. 1460. Deposition. One of Rogier’s early masterworks is Deposition (FIG. 20-13), the center panel of a triptych commissioned by the archers’ guild of Louvain for the church of Notre-Dame hors-lesmurs (Church of Our Lady—the Virgin—outside the [town] walls). Rogier acknowledged the patrons of this large painting by incorporating the crossbow (the guild’s symbol) into the decorative tracery in the corners. Instead of creating a deep landscape setting, as Jan van Eyck might have, Rogier compressed the figures and action onto a shallow stage with a golden back wall, imitating the large sculptured shrines so popular in the 15th century, of which Jacques de Baerze’s Retable de Champmol (FIG. 20-3) is one of many Netherlandish examples (compare FIGS. 20-21 and 20-22). The device admirably served his purpose of expressing maximum action within a limited space 20-13 ROGIER VAN DER WEYDEN, Deposition, center panel of a triptych from Notre-Dame hors-les-murs, Louvain, Belgium, ca. 1435-1442. Oil on wood, 7’ 22” x 8’ 7%". Museo del Prado, Madrid. Deposition resembles a relief carving in which the biblical figures act out a drama of passionate sorrow as if on a shallow theatrical stage. The painting makes an unforgettable emotional impression. Flanders 579 and dramatically confronting the viewer, but the setting of the Crucifixion in a box is unrealistic, as is the size of the cross, the arms of which are not wide enough for Jesus’s hands to have been nailed to them. The painting, with the artist’s crisp drawing and precise modeling of forms, resembles a stratified relief carving, and the viewer may wonder if this is a painting of the biblical event or a painting of a shrine representing the event. In any case, a series of lateral undulating movements gives the group a compositional unity, a formal cohesion that Rogier strengthened by depicting the sorrowful anguish that many of the figures share. Present are the Virgin, several of her half-sisters, Joseph of Arimathea, Nicodemus, Saint John the Evangelist, and Mary Magdalene. The similar poses of Christ and his mother further unify the composition, evoke the shape of the crossbows in the corner tracery, and reflect the belief that Mary suffered the same pain at the Crucifixion as her son. ART AND SOCIETY The Artist’s Profession in Flanders As they did in Italy (see “Artistic Training,” page 434), guilds controlled artistic production in Flanders. To pursue a craft, individuals had to belong to the guild representing that craft. Painters, for example, sought admission to the Guild of Saint Luke, the patron saint of painters because Luke made a portrait of the Virgin Mary (Fic. 20-1). The patron saint of the metalworkers’ guild was Saint Eligius (Fic. 20-14), who was a goldsmith before devoting himself to the Church and eventually becoming bishop of Tournai. The path to eventual membership in the guild began, for men, at an early age, when the father apprenticed his son in boyhood to a master, with whom the young aspiring painter lived. The master taught the fundamentals of his craft—how to make implements, prepare panels with gesso (plaster mixed with a binding material), and mix colors, oils, and varnishes. Once the youth mastered these procedures and learned to work in the master’s traditional manner, he usually spent several years working as a journeyman in various cities, observing and absorbing ideas from other masters. He then was eligible to become a master and could apply for admission to the guild. Fees could be very high, especially if an artist was not a citizen of the same city, as was the case, for example, when Petrus Christus of Baerle purchased citizenship in Bruges in order to join that city’s painters’ guild. Sometimes, an artist seeking admission to a guild would marry the widow of a member. (A woman could inherit her husband’s workshop, but could not run it.) Guild membership was essential for establishing an artist’s reputation and for obtaining commissions. The guild inspected paintings to evaluate workmanship and ensure that its members used quality materials. It also secured adequate payment for its artists’ labor. Women had far fewer opportunities than men to train as artists, in large part because of social and moral constraints that forbade women to reside as apprentices in the homes of male masters. Moreover, from the 16th century, when academic training courses supplemented and then replaced guild training, until the 20th century, women would not as a rule expect or be permitted instruction in figure painting, because it involved dissection of cadavers and study of the nude male model. Flemish women interested in pursuing art as a career—for example, Caterina van Hemessen (Fic. 23-16)—most often received tutoring from fathers and husbands who were professionals and whom the women assisted in all the technical procedures of the craft. Despite these Rogier’s extraordinary ability to represent flesh and fabric rivaled Jan van Eyck’s, and few painters, not even Jan, have equaled him in rendering passionate sorrow as it vibrates through a figure or distorts a tearstained face. Rogier’s depictions of the agony of loss in Deposition and of the terror of the damned in Last Judgment (FIG. 20-13A) are among the most moving and unforgettable images in religious art. It was probably Rogier whom Michelangelo had in mind when, according to the Portuguese painter Francisco de Hollanda (1517-1584), the Italian master observed, “Flemish painting [will] please the devout better than any painting of Italy, which will never cause him to shed a tear, whereas that of Flanders will cause him to shed many.” (4)20-13A Van DER WeYDEN, Last Judgment, ca. 1443-1451. for yee. 9 20-14 PEeTRus Curistus, A Goldsmith in His Shop, 1449. Oil on wood, 3’ 3” x 2’ 10". Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (Robert Lehman Collection, 1975). Once thought to depict Eligius, the patron saint of goldsmiths, Christus’s painting, made for the Bruges goldsmiths’ guild, is more likely a genre scene of a couple shopping for a wedding ring. 4 obstacles, membership records of the art guilds of Bruges and other cities reveal that a substantial number of Flemish women were able to establish themselves as artists during the 15th century. That they succeeded in negotiating the difficult path to acceptance as professionals is a testament to both their tenacity and their artistic skill, 580 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe Later Flemish Painters Robert Campin, Jan van Eyck, and Rogier van der Weyden were the leading figures of the first generation of “Northern Renaissance” painters. (Art historians usually transfer to Northern Europe, with less validity than in its original usage, the term Renaissance, coined to describe the conscious revival of classical art in Italy.) The second generation of Flemish masters, active during the latter half of the 15th century, had much in common with their illustrious predecessors, especially a preference for using oil paints to create naturalistic representations, often, although not always, of traditional Christian subjects for installation in churches. Petrus Christus. One work of uncertain Christian content is A Goldsmith in His Shop (F1G. 20-14) by Perrus Curistus (ca. 1410- 1472), who settled in Bruges in 1444. According to the traditional interpretation, A Goldsmith in His Shop portrays Saint Eligius (who was initially a master goldsmith before committing his life to God) sitting in his stall, showing an elegantly attired couple a selection of rings. The bride’s betrothal girdle lies on the table as a symbol of chastity, and the woman reaches for the ring the goldsmith weighs. The artist's inclusion of a crystal container for Eucharistic wafers (on the lower shelf to the right of Saint Eligius) and the scales (a reference to the Last Judgment) supports a religious interpretation of this painting and continues the Flemish tradition of imbuing everyday objects with symbolic significance. A halo once encircled the goldsmith’s head, seemingly confirming the religious nature of this scene. Scientists have determined, however, that the halo was a later addition by another artist, and restorers have removed it. Most scholars now think that the painting, although not devoid of religious content, should be seen as a vocational painting of the type often produced for installation in Flemish guild chapels. Although the couple's presence suggests a marriage portrait, the patrons were probably not the couple portrayed but rather the goldsmiths’ guild in Bruges. Saint Eligius was the patron saint of gold- and silversmiths, blacksmiths, and metalworkers, all of whom shared a chapel in a building adjacent to their meetinghouse. The reconsecration of this chapel took place in 1449, the same date as the Christus painting. Therefore, it seems probable that the artist painted A Goldsmith in His Shop, which illustrates an economic transaction and focuses on the goldsmith’s profession, specifically for the guild chapel. A guild chapel is also the likely original setting of Rogier van der Weyden’s Saint Luke Drawing the Virgin (FIG. 20-1). As noted, in the 15th century, in addition to their primary function as “trade unions, guilds played an increasingly important role in community life and often became major patrons of art in their cities (see “The Artist’s Profession in Flanders,’ page 580). Christus went to great lengths to produce a historically credible image. For example, the variety of objects depicted in the painting serves as advertisement for the goldsmiths’ guild. Included are the goldsmiths’ raw materials (precious stones, beads, crystal, coral, and seed pearls) scattered among finished products (rings, buckles, and brooches). The pewter vessels on the upper shelves are donation pitchers, which town leaders gave to distinguished guests. All these meticulously painted objects not only attest to the centrality and importance of goldsmiths to both the secular and sacred communities but also enhance the naturalism of the painting. The convex mirror in the foreground showing another couple and a street with houses serves to extend the painting's space into the viewer's space, further creating the illusion of reality, as in Jan van Eyck’s Arnolfini portrait (FIG. 20-11). Dieric Bouts. In Last Supper (FIG. 20-15), Dier1c Bouts (ca. 1415-1475) of Haarlem chose a different means of suggesting 20-15 Dueric Bouts, Altarpiece of the Holy Sacrament, Saint Peter's, Louvain, Belgium, 1464-1468. Oil on wood, center panel (Last Supper) 6’ x 5’. The Last Supper, the central panel of this altarpiece, is one of the earliest Northern Renaissance paintings to employ Italian linear perspective. Included are portraits of the work’s Flemish patrons. Flanders 581 spatial recession. The painting is the central panel of the Altarpiece of the Holy Sacrament, which the Confraternity of the Holy Sacrament in Louvain commissioned in 1464. Four years later, Bouts became the city’s official painter and was asked to produce a series of panels—including Wrongful Beheading of the Count (FIG. 20-15A) and Justice of Otto III (FIG. )—for Louvain town hall. Bouts’s Last Supper is one of the earliest Northern Renaissance paintings to employ linear perspective and a vanishing point to create the illusion of depth. All of the central rooms orthogonals (converging diagonal lines imagined to be behind and perpendicular to the picture plane) lead to the vanishing point in the center of the mantelpiece above Jesus's head. The small side room, however, has its own vanishing point, and neither it nor the vanishing point of the main room falls on the horizon of the landscape (the horizon line) seen through the windows, as in Italian Renaissance paintings composed according to the strict rules of linear perspective (see f Linear Perspective,’ page 599). Tha ie We ae . In Last Supper, Bouts did not depict the (4)20-15B Bouts, ie ves ; Hiioe Pons il biblical narrative itself but instead presented ca. 1470-1473. Jesus in the role of a priest performing the liturgical ritual of the consecration of the Eucharistic wafer. By dividing the apostles into two asymmetrical groups with no one sitting at the middle of the near side of the table, Bouts focused attention on the Savior and the food platter and wine chalice at the table's center. Bouts’s Last Supper contrasts strongly with other depictions of the same subject, which often represented Jesus's prediction of Judas’s betrayal or his comforting of John. The 4)20-15A Bouts, Beheading of the Count, ca. 1478-1481. Confraternity of the Holy Sacrament dedicated itself to the worship of the Eucharist, and the smaller panels on the altarpiece’s wings depict Old Testament prefigurations of the Eucharist—for example, at the top right, the gathering of manna in the desert and, at bottom left, Jews celebrating Passover (the occasion for Jesus's final meal). Bouts also added four servants (two looking through the windowlike opening in the rear wall and two standing) not mentioned in the New Testament account, all dressed in Flemish attire. These are portraits of the four members of the confraternity who contracted Bouts to paint the altarpiece, continuing the Flemish tradition of inserting into representations of biblical events portraits of the painting's patrons, first noted in the Mérode Triptych (Fic. 20-8), where the Inghelbrechts are also looking into the room from outside; that is, they are not participants in but’witnesses of the biblical event. Hugo van der Goes. By the mid-15th century, Flemish art had achieved renown throughout Europe. The Portinari Altarpiece (r1G. 20-16), for example, is a large-scale Flemish work in a family chapel in Florence, Italy. The artist who received the commission was HUGO VAN DER Goss (ca. 1440-1482), who joined the painters’ guild of Ghent as a master in 1467 and served as the guild’s dean from 1473 to 1475. Hugo painted the triptych in Flanders for Tommaso Portinari, an Italian shipowner and agent in Bruges for the powerful Medici bank of Florence. The altarpiece was Portinari’s gift to the church of Sant’Egidio, and he appears on the wings with his family and their patron saints, who are much larger than the donors. The main panel, Adoration of the Shepherds, depicts a subject based on the 14th-century vision of a Swedish saint in which Mary, instead of cradling her newborn son, kneels solemnly to join Joseph, the angels, and the shepherds in adoring the infant Savior, who lies on the ground and glows with divine light. In order to situate the main actors at the center of the panel, Hugo tilted the ground, a compositional device he may have derived from the tilted stage floors of 15th-century mystery plays. Three shepherds enter 20-16 HUGO VAN DER Goss, Adoration of the Shepherds (Portinari Altarpiece, open), from Sant’Egidio, Florence, Italy, ca. 1473-1478. Tempera and oil on wood, center panel 8’ 32” a x 10’, each wing 8' 34” x 4’ 74”. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence. This altarpiece is a rare instance of the awarding of a major commission in Italy to a Flemish painter. The Florentines admired Hugo's realistic details and brilliant portrayal of human character. 582 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe from the right rear. Hugo represented them in attitudes of wonder, piety, and gaping curiosity. Their lined faces, work-worn hands, and uncouth dress and manner indicate that they are common folk, very different than the three magi who will soon come to adore the newborn Jesus. The architecture and a continuous Northern European land- scape unify the three panels. (The bare trees of the setting estab- lish that it is winter, the season of Christ’s birth.) Symbols surface throughout the altarpiece. Iris and columbine flowers are emblems of the sorrows of the Virgin. The angels represent the 15 joys of Mary. A sheaf of wheat stands for Bethlehem (the “house of bread” in Hebrew), a reference to the Eucharist. The harp of David, emblazoned over the building’s portal in the middle distance (just to the right of the Virgin's head), signifies the ancestry of Christ. To stress the meaning and significance of the illustrated event, Hugo revived medieval pictorial devices. Small scenes shown in the background of the altarpiece represent (from left to right) the journey of Mary and Joseph to Bethlehem, the annunciation to the shepherds, and the arrival of the magi. Hugos variation in the scale of his figures to differentiate them by their importance to the central event also reflects older traditions. Still, he put a vigorous, penetrating realism to work in a new direction, characterizing human beings according to their social level while showing their common humanity. After Portinari placed the altarpiece in his family’s chapel in the Florentine church of Sant’Egidio, it created a considerable stir among Italian artists. Although the painting may have seemed unstructured to the Italians and the employing of hierarchy of scale old fashioned, Hugo’s masterful technique and what the Florentines deemed incredible realism in representing drapery, flowers, animals, and, above all, human character and emotion made a deep impression on them. At least one Florentine artist, Domenico Ghirlandaio (FIGs. 21-26 and 21-27), paid tribute to the Flemish master by using Hugo’s most striking motif, the adoring shepherds, in one of his own Nativity paintings. Hans Memling. Hugo's contemporary, HANS MEMLING (ca. 1430- 1494), may have trained as a painter in Rogier van der Weyden’s studio. He became a citizen of Bruges in 1465 and received numerous commissions from the city’s wealthy merchants, Flemish and foreign alike. He specialized in portraits of his patrons (one of whom was Tommaso Portinari; FIG. 20-18A) and images of the Madonna. Memling’s many paintings of the Virgin portray young, slight, pretty princesses, each holding a doll-like infant Jesus. The center panel of the Saint John Altarpiece is Virgin with Saints and Angels (FIG. 20-17). The patrons of this altarpiece—two brothers and two sisters of the order of the Hospital of Saint John in Bruges—appear on the exterior side panels (not illustrated). In the main panel, two angels, one playing a musical instrument and the other holding a book, flank the Virgin. To the sides of Mary’s throne stand Saints John the Baptist on the left and John the Evangelist on the right. Seated in the foreground are Saints Catherine and Barbara. This gathering celebrates the mystic marriage of Saint Catherine of Alexandria, one of many virgin saints believed to have entered into a spiritual marriage with Christ. As one of the most revered virgins of Christ, Saint Catherine provided a model of devotion that resonated with women viewers (especially nuns). The altarpiece exudes an opulence that results from the rich colors, the meticulously depicted tapestries and brocades, and the serenity of the figures. The composition 20-17 Hans MEMLING, Virgin with Saints and Angels, center panel of the Saint John Altarpiece, Hospitaal Sint Jan, Bruges, to 3n ' " . ro3n reoly Belgium, 1479. Oil on wood, center panel 5 73" x 5' 72", each wing 5’ 77” x 2' 73". Memling specialized in images of the Madonna. His Saint John Altarpiece exudes an opulence that results from the sparkling and luminous oil colors and the realistic depiction of rich tapestries and brocades. Flanders 583 ree) 3 20-18 Hans MEMLING, Diptych of Martin van Nieuwenhove, 1487. Oil on wood, each panel 1’ 53” x 1’ 1”. Memlingmuseum, Bruges. In this diptych, the Virgin and Child pay a visit to the home of 23-year-old Martin van Nieuwenhove. A round convex mirror reflects the three figures and unites the two halves of the diptych spatially. is balanced and serene, the color sparkling and luminous, and the execution of the highest technical quality. Memling combined portraiture and Madonna imagery again in a much less ambitious—and more typical—work (FIG. 20-18) that he painted for Martin van Nieuwenhove (1464-1500). The smaller scale of the private commission and its much more intimate character underscore the different approaches that painters regularly took when producing artworks for different kinds of patrons and for public versus private settings. Martin van Nieuwenhove was a member of an important Bruges family that held various posts in the civic government. He himself served as burgomeister of Bruges in 1497. The painting takes the form of a diptych, with the patron portrayed on the right wing praying to the Madonna and Child on the left wing, a format invented by Rogier van der Weyden. According to inscriptions on the frames, van Nieuwenhove commissioned the work in 1487 when he was 23 years old. He died only 13 years later, 3 years after becoming mayor. The format of the van Nieuwenhove diptych follows the pattern that Memling used earlier for his wedding triptych Tommaso Portinari and Maria Baroncelli (Fic. A) but with only a single (male) portrait. (The lost central section of the Portinari triptych probably closely resembled the van Nieuwenhove Madonna and Child.) Memling’s portrayals of Mary and Jesus consistently feature a tender characterization of the young Virgin and her nude infant son. Here, however, Memling set both the Madonna and her patron in the interior of a wellappointed Flemish home featuring stained-glass windows. The window to the left of the Virgin's head bears van Nieuwenhove's coat of arms. The window behind the donor depicts his patron saint, Martin of.Tours. These precisely recorded details identify the home as van Nieuwenhove's (the Minnewater Bridge in Bruges is visible through the open window), and the Madonna and Child have honored him by coming to his private residence. Even Saint Luke had to go to the Virgin’s home to paint her portrait (FIG. 20-1), but the conceit is a familiar one in Flemish painting. An early example is the Annunciation taking place in the home of Peter Inghelbrecht in Robert Campin’s Mérode Triptych (F1G. 20-8). In the Memling portrait diptych, the Christ Child sits on the same ledge as the donor’s open prayer book. Also uniting the two wings of the diptych is the round convex mirror behind the Virgins right shoulder in which the viewer sees the reflection of the Virgin’s back and van Nieuwenhove as well as the rest of the room (compare FIGS. 20-11 and 20-14). i MeMLING, Tommaso Portinari and Maria Baroncelli, ca. 1470. 584 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe FRANCE In contrast to the prosperity and peace that Flanders enjoyed dur- ing the 15th century, in France the Hundred Years’ War crippled economic enterprise and prevented political stability. The anarchy of war and the weakness of the kings gave rise to a group of duch- ies, each with significant power and the resources to commission major artworks. The strongest and wealthiest of these has already been examined—the duchy of Burgundy, which controlled Flanders, as well as the duchy of Berry in France. The French dukes of Bourbon and Nemours as well as members of the French royal court were also important art patrons. In addition to illustrated books, such as the Trés Riches Heures du Duc de Berry (F1Gs. 20-5 and 20-6), independent paintings were popular in France, as in Flanders, for private devotional use. The preferred medium was oil paint on wood panels. Jean Fouquet. Among the French artists whose paintings were in high demand was JEAN Fouquer (ca. 1425-1478). Fouquet’s workshop was in Tours, and he received important commissions from King Charles VII (r. 1422-1461, the patron and client of Jacques Coeur; F1G. 13-31) and from the duke of Nemours and other elite members of the French aristocracy. Fouquet painted a diptych (FIG. 20-19) for Etienne Chevalier, who, despite his lowly birth as the son of one of Charles VII’s secretaries, rose to become royal treasurer in 1452. In the left panel of the Melun Diptych (named for its original location in Melun Cathedral), Chevalier appears with his patron saint, Saint Stephen (Etienne in French). Appropriately, 20-19 Jean Fouquet, Melun Diptych, ca. 1452. Left wing: Etienne Chevalier and Saint Stephen. Oil on wood, 3' 3" x 2' 93". ‘ Dyget : : rin rol : +. Gemiildegalerie, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Berlin. Right wing: Virgin and Child. Oil on wood, 3’ 17 x 2°97. Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp. Fouquet’s donor portrait of Chevalier depicts his prominent patron as devout—kneeling, with hands clasped in prayer. The representation of the pious donor with his standing saint recalls Flemish art, as do the three-quarter stances and the realism of Chevalier's portrait. The artist portrayed Saint Stephen, whose head also has a portraitlike quality, holding the stone symbolizing his martyrdom (death by stoning) atop a volume of the holy scriptures, thereby ensuring that viewers can properly identify the saint. Fouquet rendered the entire image in meticulous detail and included a highly ornamented architectural setting. In its original diptych form (the two panels are now in different museums), the viewer would follow the gaze of Chevalier and Saint Stephen over to the right panel, which depicts the Virgin Mary and Christ Child in a most unusual way—with marblelike flesh, surrounded by red and blue cherubs (chubby winged child angels). The juxtaposition of these two images enabled the patron to bear witness to the sacred. The integration of sacred and secular (especially the political or personal), prevalent in other Northern Renaissance artworks, also emerges here, which complicates the reading of this diptych. Agnés Sorel (1421-1450), the mistress of Charles VII, was Fouquet’s model for the Virgin Mary, whose left breast is exposed, presumably to nurse the infant Jesus, but she does not look at her son or the viewer. (Mary as nursing mother is a not uncommon way of representing the Virgin in Northern Europe; compare Fic. 20-1.) Chevalier commissioned this painting after Sorel’s death, probably by poisoning while pregnant with the king’s child. Thus, in addition to the religious interpretation of this diptych, there is surely a personal ly Fouquet's meticulous representation of a pious kneeling donor with a standing patron saint recalls Flemish painting, as do the threequarter stances and the realism of the donor’s portrait head. France 585 20-20 KoNnrRAD WITZ, Miraculous Draft of Fish, exterior wing of Altarpiece of Saint Peter, from the Chapel of Notre-Dame des Maccabées, Cathedral of Saint Peter, Geneva, Switzerland, 1444. Oil on wood, 4' 3” x 5' 1”. Musée d'Art et d@ Histcire, Geneva. Konrad Witz set this biblical story on Lake Geneva. The painting is one of the first 15th-century works depicting a specific locale and is noteworthy for the painter’s skill in rendering water effects. and political narrative here as well, made all the more complex given that Sorel gave birth to three of the king’s daughters, but never a son. HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE Because the Holy Roman Empire (whose core was Germany) did not participate in the drawn-out saga of the Hundred Years’ War, its economy remained stable and prosperous. Without a dominant court to commission artworks, wealthy merchants and clergy became the primary German art patrons during the 15th century. Panel Painting The art of the early Northern Renaissance in the Holy Roman Empire displays a pronounced stylistic diversity. Some artists followed developments in Flemish painting, and large-scale altarpieces featuring naturalistically painted biblical themes were familiar sights in German churches. Konrad Witz. Among the most notable 15th-century German altarpieces is the Altarpiece of Saint Peter, painted by KonRAD W1Tz (ca. 1400-1446) for the chapel of Notre-Dame des Maccabées in the Cathedral of Saint Peter in Geneva. Signed by “Magister Conradus of Basel” and dated 1444, the altarpiece is a triptych featuring Witz’s paintings on both the exterior and interior. Miraculous Draft of Fish (F1G. 20-20) appears on one of the exterior wings. The other (not illustrated) depicts the release of Saint Peter from prison. The central panel is lost. On the interior wings, Witz painted scenes of the adoration of the magi and of Saint Peter’s presentation of the donor (Bishop Francois de Mies) to the Virgin and Child. Miraculous Draft of Fish shows Peter, the first pope, unsuccessfully trying to emulate Christ walking on water. The choice of this episode from among others in Peter's life (see “Early Christian Saints,” pages 246-247) may be a commentary on the part of Witz’s patron, the Geneva cardinal, on the limited power of the pope in Rome. The painting is particularly significant because of the landscape’s prominence. Witz showed his considerable skill in the recording of water effects—the shimmering sky on the slowly moying lake surface, the mirrored reflections of the figures in the boat, and the transparency of the shallow water in the foreground. He observed and represented the landscape so carefully that art historians have been able to determine the exact location shown. Witz presented a view of the shores of Lake Geneva, with the town of Geneva on the right and Le Mole Mountain in the distance behind Christ’s head. This painting is one of the first 15th-century works depicting a specific, identifiable site. The work of other leading German painters of the mid-15th century—for example, STEFAN LOCHNER (ca. 1400-1451)— retained medieval features to a much greater degree, as is immediately evident in a comparison between Witz’s landscape and Lochner’s Madonna in the Rose Garden (FIG. 20-20A). (4)20-20A LocHner, Madonna in the Rose Garden, ca. 14385-1440. 586 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe As in Flanders (1G. 20-3), in the Holy Roman Empire many of the leading 15th-century artists specialized in carving large wood retables. These grandiose sculpted altarpieces reveal the lingering power of the Late Gothic style. Veit Stoss. The sculptor Verr Stross (ca. 1447-1533) trained in the Upper Rhine region, possibly in Strasbourg, but settled in Krakow (in present-day Poland) in 1477. In that year, he began work on a monumental altarpiece for the church of Saint Mary in Krakow, paid for by the city’s citizens. In the central boxlike shrine is Death and Assumption of the Virgin (F1G. 20-21), peopled by huge carved, painted, and gilded figures, some 9 feet high. On both the outer and inner faces of the wings, Stoss portrayed scenes from the lives of Christ and Mary. The altar forcefully expresses the intense piety of Gothic culture in its late phase, when artists used every figural and ornamental motif in the repertoire of Gothic art to heighten the emotion and glorify sacred events. In the center panel of the Krakow altarpiece, Christ's disciples congregate around the Virgin, who collapses, dying. One of them supports her, while another wrings his hands in grief. Above, Mary rises to Heaven with the resurrected Christ. Stoss posed others in attitudes of woe and psychic shock, striving for realism in every minute detail. He engulfed the figures in restless, twisting, and curving swaths of drapery whose broken and writhing lines unite the whole tableau in a vision of agitated emotion. The artist's massing of sharp, broken, and pierced forms that dart flamelike through the composition— at once unifying and animating it—recalls the design principles of Late Gothic architecture (FIG. 13-28). Indeed, in the Krakow altarpiece, Stoss merged sculpture and architecture, enhancing their union with paint and gilding. The Krakoéw altarpiece gives modern viewers the opportunity to appreciate the polychromy that was standard in ancient and medieval sculpture in both wood and stone. Examples such as this one are unfortunately rare. The vast majority of preserved statues and reliefs from antiquity and the Middle Ages give a false impression of their original appearance (compare Fics. 3-13A and 5-63A) because the paint has disappeared. 20-21 Vert Sross, Death and Assumption of the Virgin, center panel of the Altarpiece of the Virgin Mary (with wings open), Church of Saint Mary, Krakow, Poland, 1477-1489. Painted and gilded lime-wood, central panel 23’ 9" high. In this huge painted and gilded sculptured wood altarpiece, Stoss used every figural and ornamental element from the vocabulary of Gothic art to heighten the emotion and glorify the sacred event. Holy Roman Empire 587 Tilman Riemenschneider. Assumption of the Virgin is also the center panel of the Creglingen Altarpiece (FIG. 20-22), carved by TiLMAN RIEMENSCHNEIDER (ca. 1460-1531) of Wiirzburg for a parish church in Creglingen, Germany. Riemenschneider incor- porated intricate Gothic forms, especially in the 30-foot-tall altar- pieces elaborate canopy, but unlike Stoss, he did not paint the figures or the background, relying instead purely on sculptural form. The Wiirzburg master succeeded in setting the whole design 20-22 TiLMAN RIEMENSCHNEIDER, Assumption of the Virgin (Creglingen Altarpiece), Herrgottskirche, Creglingen, Germany, ca. 1495-1505. Lime-wood, 30’ 2” high. Riemenschneider specialized in carving large unpainted wood retables. His works feature intricate Gothic tracery and religious figures whose bodies are almost lost within their swirling garments. into fluid motion by employing an endless and restless line running through the garments of the figures. The draperies float and flow around bodies lost within them, serving not as descriptions but as design elements that tie the figures to one another and to the framework. A look of psychic strain, a facial expression common in Riemenschneider’s work, heightens the spirituality of the figures, immaterial and weightless as they appear. A new age blossomed in the 15th century with a sudden technological advance that had widespread effects—the invention by Johannes Gutenberg (ca. 1400-1468) of moveable type around 1450 and the development of the printing press. Printing had been known in China centuries before, but had never fostered, as it did in 15th-century Europe, a revolution in written communication and in the generation and management of information. Printing provided new and challenging media for artists, and the earliest form was the woodcut. Artists produced inexpensive woodcuts such as the Buxheim Saint Christopher (F1G. 20-22A) before the development of moveable-type print- ‘ing. But when the improved economy and a = rise in literacy necessitated the production of illustrated books on a grand scale, artists met the challenge of bringing the woodcut picture onto the same letterpress text pages (see “How to Illustrate Printed Books,” page 589). Buxheim Saint Christopher, 1423(?). Martin Schongauer. The woodcut medium hardly had matured when printmakers introduced the technique of engraving (see “Engrav- ing and Etching,” page 590). Begun in the 1430s and well developed by 1450, engraving proved much more flexible than woodcut. Predictably, in the second half of the century, engraving began to replace the woodcut process for making both book illustrations and widely popular single prints. Not surprisingly, many of the earli- est engravers were professional goldsmiths, who easily applied their training in incising designs into gold and silver jewelry to the new art form. 588 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS How to Illustrate Printed Books With the invention of moveable type in the 15th century and the new widespread availability of paper from commercial mills, the art of printmaking developed rapidly in Europe. A print is an artwork created by transferring a design on a metal plate or a wood or stone block to a sheet of paper. Prints are usually produced in multiple impressions. The Set of prints that an artist creates from a single block or plate is called an edition. Like the manufacturing of books on a press, the printmaking process involves the transfer of ink froma printing surface to paper. This can be accomplished in several ways. The oldest and simplest is the relief method—carving the design into a surface, usually a soft wood, such as pear. Relief printing requires artists to conceptualize their images in reverse—that is, they must draw mirror images of the intended design on the wood block. They then remove the surface areas around the drawn lines using a gouging instrument. Thus when the printmaker inks the ridges that correspond to the original (reversed) drawing, the hollow areas remain dry, and a correctly oriented image results when the artist presses the printing block against paper. Because artists produce woodcuts through a subtractive process (removing parts of the material), it is difficult to create very thin, fluid, and closely spaced lines. Moreover, if the ridges are too thin, they will break during printing. As a result, woodcut prints (for example, Fics. |-9, 20-22A, and 20-23) tend to exhibit stark contrasts between the dark lines and the blank background. During the later 15th century, publishers realized that the woodcut was the ideal medium for solving the problem of illustrating their new printed books. The new technology quickly led to the demise of the manuscript illuminator as well as the scribe, both of whom had been essential for the production of illustrated books through the late Middle Ages, whether they were monks working in monastic scriptoria or lay professionals employed in the for-profit workshops of Paris and other cities. The most ambitious early effort to produce low-cost massproduced printed books was the so-called Nuremberg Chronicle, a history of the world produced in Nuremberg by Anton KosBeRGER (ca. 1445-1518), with more than 650 illustrations furnished by the workshop of MicHaet WotcemuT (1434-1519). The hand-colored page illustrated here (Fic. 20-23) represents Madeburga (modern Magdeburg, Germany). The blunt, simple lines of the woodcut technique give a detailed perspective of Magdeburg, its harbor and shipping, its walls and towers, its churches and municipal buildings, and a statue-topped columnar monument. Despite the numerous architectural structures, this illustration is not an accurate depiction of the city but the product of the artist’s fanciful imagination. Wolgemut often used the same image to illustrate different cities, even those with very little in common— for example, Verona, Italy, and Damascus, Syria. This depiction of Magdeburg is a generic view of a late medieval German town, not a portrait of a specific place. Regardless, the Nuremberg Chronicle is a monument to a new craft, which expanded in concert with the art of the printed book. 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(Puc eft Rolandus quem(on fama eft) tempeftate fua cozporte wan uus ferer poffit. Alreram 7 mit quogs fancrt mauri sala (eg ae 1493. Woodcut, 1 6%" x 2' 12”. magnitudie.longe ceterie alijs pzcftiffe.€ uuu foztia facta per ynmerfuim ozbeny celeb: Printed by ANTON 2 (tae ete Mest a cine : KOBERGER. ms ik : * We 4 Si. 4 * . bia pee x ioe -PMadeburea a abe The Nuremberg Chronicle is an early example of woodcut illustrations in printed books. The more than 650 pictures include detailed views of towns, but they are generic rather than specific portrayals. Holy Roman Empire 589 MATERIALS AND TECHNIQUES Engraving and Etching in contrast to the production of relief prints, in the intaglio method of printmaking, the artist incises (cuts) the lines on a metal plate, often copper, rather than cuts away the area around the lines, as the relief printer does. The image can be created on the plate manually (engraving or drypoint; for example, Fic. 20-24) using a tool (a burin or stylus) or chemically (etching; for example, Fic. 25-16). In the etching process, an acid bath eats into the exposed parts of the plate where the artist has drawn through an acid-resistant coating. When the artist inks the surface of the intaglio plate and wipes it clean, the ink is forced into the incisions. Then the artist runs the plate and paper through a roller press, and the paper absorbs the remaining ink, creating the print. Because the artist “draws” the image onto the plate, intaglio prints differ in character from relief prints, such as woodcuts. Engravings, drypoints, and etchings generally present a wider variety of linear effects, as is immediately evident in a comparison of the roughly contemporaneous woodcut (Fig. 20-23) by Michael Wolgemut and an engraving (Fic. 20-24) by Martin Schongauer. Intaglio prints also often reveal to a greater extent evidence of the artist’s touch, the result of the hand’s changing pressure and shifting directions. The paper and inks that artists use also affect the finished look of the printed image. During the 15th and 16th centuries, European printmakers used papers produced from cotton and linen rags that papermakers mashed with water into a pulp. The papermakers then applied a thin layer of this pulp to a wire screen and let it dry to create the paper. As contact with Asia increased, printmakers made greater use of what was called Japan paper (of mulberry fibers) and China paper. Artists, then as now, could select from a wide variety of inks. The type and proportion of the ink ingredients affect the consistency, color, and oiliness of inks, which various papers absorb differently. Paper is lightweight, and the portability of prints has been an important factor in their appeal to artists. The opportunity to produce numerous impressions from the same print surface also made printmaking attractive to 15th- and 16th-century artists. In addition, prints can be sold at much lower prices than paintings or sculptures. Consequently, prints reached a far wider audience than did one-of-a-kind artworks. The number and quality of existing 15th- and 16th-century European prints attest to the importance of the new print medium. MARTIN SCHONGAUER (ca. 1430-1491) of Colmar, a painter and the son of a goldsmith, was the most skilled and subtle Northern European master of metal engraving. His Saint Anthony Tormented by Demons (FIG. 20-24) shows both the versatility of the medium and the artist’s mastery of it. The stoic saint is caught in a revolving thornbush of spiky demons, who claw and tear at him furiously. With unsurpassed skill and subtlety, Schongauer incised lines of varying thickness and density into a metal plate and created marvelous distinctions of tonal values and textures—from smooth skin to rough cloth, from the furry and feathery to the hairy and scaly. The use of cross-hatching (sets of engraved lines at right angles) to describe forms, which Schongauer probably developed, became standard among German graphic artists. The Italians preferred parallel hatching (r1G. 21-29) and rarely adopted crosshatching, which, in keeping with the general Northern Renaissance 20-24 MARTIN SCHONGAUER, Saint Anthony Tormented by Demons, ca. 1480. Engraving, 1’ 7” x 9”. Fondazione Magnani Rocca, Corte di Mamiano. Schongauer was the most skilled of the early masters of metal engraving. By using a burin to incise lines in a copper plate, he was able to create a marvelous variety of-tonal values and textures. approach to art, tends to describe the surfaces of things rather than their underlying structures. Schongauer probably engraved Saint Anthony around 1480. By then, the political geography of Europe had changed dramatically. Charles the Bold, who had assumed the title of duke of Burgundy in 1467, died in 1477, bringing to an end the Burgundian dream of forming a strong middle kingdom between France and the Holy Roman Empire. After Charles’s death at the battle of Nancy, the French monarchy reabsorbed the southern Burgundian lands, and the Netherlands passed to the Holy Roman Empire by virtue of the dynastic marriage of Charles's daughter, Mary of Burgundy (r1G. 20-7), to Maximilian of Habsburg, inaugurating a new political and artistic era in Northern Europe, examined in Chapter 23. The next two chapters, however, explore Italian developments in painting, sculpture, and architecture during the 15th and 16th centuries, 590 CHAPTER 20 Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe THE BIG PICTURE Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Northern Europe French Ducal Courts The most powerful rulers north of the Alps during the first three quarters of the 15th century were the dukes of Burgundy. They controlled Flanders, which derived its wealth from wool and banking, and were great art patrons. Duke Philip the Bold (r. 1863-1404) endowed the Carthusian monastery at Champmol, near Dijon, which became a ducal mausoleum. The head of Philip’s sculptural workshop was Claus Sluter, whose Well of Moses features innovative statues of prophets with portraitlike features and realistic costumes. In the 15th century, Northern European artists popularized the use of oil paints on wood panels. By superimposing translucent glazes, painters could create richer colors than possible using tempera or fresco. One of the earliest examples of oil painting is Melchior Broederlam’s wings of the Retable de Champmol, painted for Philip the Bold. Carved wood narrative reliefs by Jacques de Baerze fill the retable’s interior. The Limbourg brothers expanded the illusionistic capabilities of manuscript illumination in the Book of Hours they produced for Jean, duke of Berry (r. 1860-1416) and brother of King Charles V (r. 1864-1380). Their full-page calendar pictures alternately represent the nobility and the peasantry, always in seasonal, naturalistic settings with realistically painted figures. Flanders A major art form in Flemish churches and private homes alike was the altarpiece with folding wings. In Robert Campin’s Mérode Triptych, the Annunciation takes place in a Flemish home. As is typical of “Northern Renaissance” art, the everyday objects in the triptych have symbolic significance. The largest altarpiece of the era is the Ghent Altarpiece, begun by Hubert van Eyck and completed by his brother Jan. Jan van Eyck, Rogier van der Weyden, and others established portraiture as an important art form in 15th-century Flanders. Their subjects were successful businessmen, both Flemish and foreign, and occasionally themselves. Jan portrayed himself wearing a red turban, and Rogier represented himself in the guise of Saint Luke drawing the Virgin. Among the other major Flemish painters were Petrus Christus and Hans Memling of Bruges, Dieric Bouts of Louvain, and Hugo van der Goes of Ghent, all of whom produced both altarpieces for churches and portraits for the homes of wealthy merchants. France and the Holy Roman Empire During the 15th century, the Hundred Years’ War crippled the French economy, but dukes and members of the royal court still commissioned some notable artworks. French court art—for example, Jean Fouquet’s Melun Diptych—owes a large debt to Flemish painting in style and technique as well as in the integration of sacred and secular themes. The Late Gothic style remained popular in 15th-century Germany for large carved wood retables featuring highly emotive figures amid Gothic tracery. The leading sculptors were Veit Stoss and Tilman Riemenschneider. The major German innovation of the 15th century was the development of the printing press, which publishers soon used to produce books with woodcut illustrations. Woodcuts are relief prints in which the artist carves out the areas around the lines to be printed. German artists, such as Martin Schongauer, were the earliest masters of engraving. The intaglio technique enables a wider variety of linear effects because the artist incises the image directly onto a metal plate. de Baerze, Retable de Champmol, 1399 Limbourg brothers, Les Tres Riches Heures du Duc de Berry, 1413-1416 = ea ame S75 van Eyck, Ghent Altarpiece, ca. 1423-14382 Fouquet, Melun Diptych, ca. 1452 Nuremberg Chronicle, 1493 591 ¢21-1b Botticelli’s revival of the theme of the female nude, largely absent from medieval art, was consistent with the Quattrocento view that beholding physical beauty prompts the contemplation of spiritual beauty. <€21-1a Inspired by a poem by Angelo Poliziano, Botticelli painted Birth of Venus for the Medici between 1484 and 1486. At the left, Zephyrus, carrying Chloris, blows Venus on a cockleshell to Cyprus. 21-1 Sanpro Botticetu, Birth of Venus, ca. 1484-1486. Tempera on canvas, 5’ 9” x 9’ 2”. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence. 421-1¢ Awaiting the newborn goddess of love on her sacred island is the nymph Pomona, who runs to meet Venus with a brocaded mantle. Her draperies undulate loosely in the gentle gusts of wind.