Early Flemish Portraits 1425-1525: The Metropolitan Museum of Art ...

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16. Jan van Eyck's painting, dated 1436, shows the donor Joris (George) van der Paele presented to the Virgin and Child by his patron saint, George, in the company of Saint Donatian. Van der Paele was a canon at the Cathedral of Saint Donatian, in Bruges, to which this work was given, and his glance is directed toward that saint in van Eyck's picture. The degree to which Jan here achieved an illusion of reality thatfulfilled the donor's aspirations is unsurpassed by any other artist of the century. Groeningemuseum, Bruges in the chapel that the Vijds financed at great expense. A deed registered before the Ghent magistrates and the church administrators in 1435 stipulates that a Mass at the chapel's altar be celebrated each day in perpetuity in honor of God, the Virgin Mary, and all the saints, for the donors' own salvation and that of their ancestors (they had no children). The degree to which their likenesses seem to be living, breathing presences is heightened by the illusionistic sculptural representations of Saints John the Baptist and John the Evangelist, to whom, as intercessors, the donors' prayers are addressed. An inscription across the lower edges of the panels' frames prominently records Vijd's commission and indicates that he engaged "the best painters that could be found." The donor's zeal was to the greater glory of God, but by association he and his wife share in the glory. The interior of the altarpiece displays the Universal Communion of All Souls in Christ-an eternal Mass in which the donors, through their foundation, hope to participate, as is indicated by their presence in prayerful attitudes on the exterior. There is a sense of drama in the relationship between the exterior and interior: the donors anticipate Judgment Day, when they will be received among the blessed.
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Page 20 and 21: 14. On the lower register of the ex
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Page 31 and 32: 20. At an early but unknown date, t
Page 33 and 34: tion. As seen particularly in works
Page 35: opposite 23. In this detail ofJoos
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Page 44 and 45: traits, these artists were capable
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Early Flemish Portraits 1425-1525: The Metropolitan Museum of Art ...

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