Lecture 14: Jan van Eyck and Northern Renaissance Art
Our next image shows a detail of the donors with St. John the Baptist and
St. John the Evangelist. The donors were Jodòcus Vyd and his wife, Isabel
Borluut. The passage is a striking example of the descriptive realism
of Netherlandish portraiture in the 15th century. Like Enrico Scrovegni
and the Arena Chapel, it seems that this couple had a particular reason to
commission this altarpiece and offer money to the church—to redeem the
family name. Jodòcus was the son of the treasurer of the duke of Burgundy,
and his father was imprisoned for theft. Altarpieces in northern Europe were
often dominated by sculpture, or painting shared the space with sculpture, to
a much greater degree than in Italy. Many altarpieces had wooden sculpture
because of the great forests in the region. Marble sculpture was less common.
Imitated marble sculpture was sometimes introduced into illusionistic niches,
as van Eyck has done here.The second middle level contains the central image of the exterior of the
altarpiece with the Annunciation. The Archangel Gabriel is at the left, and the
Virgin Mary is on the right. The drapery is sharply sculptural but is given the
warm tone of muslin, as the ¿ gures themselves are rendered in À esh tones.
As in Simone Martini’s Annunciation, Gabriel’s spoken words are printed
out here, in Gothic script, Ave gratia plena (“Hail thou that art full of grace”).
Words also proceed from Mary’s head, ecce ancilla (“Behold the handmaid
of the Lord”). These words are inscribed upside down so that they may be
read not by the viewer but by God! The dove of the Holy Spirit above Mary’s
head marks the conception of Jesus. Mary’s side of the painting contains a
niche in a wall that houses a lavábo (a hand-washing dish), a pitcher, and
a white towel, each signifying purity and virginity. Above the pitcher is a
trefoil window, the three circles symbolizing the Trinity.When the Ghent Altarpiece wings are folded outward to reveal the interior,
we see that the space is divided into two levels. The upper level shows the
three huge ¿ gures thought to be painted by Hubert van Eyck: God the Father,
À anked by Mary and St. John the Baptist. This central trio is À anked by two
panels painted with groups of musical angels. The ¿ gures of Adam on the left
and Eve on the right close the sequence. The lower level shows a large multi-
¿ gure composition, the thematic focus of the altarpiece, the Adoration of the
Lamb. There is a pair of panels on each side, and as with the Annunciation
on the outside, the entire space is represented as continuous.