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

33, 34. The Metropolitan Museum's
Portrait of a Woman by
Quentin Massys (opposite) is one
of a pair of husband and wife. The
man's portrait (left), in a Swiss
private collection, is treated identically,
with the sitter viewed behind
a repoussoir arch composed of two
marble columns, a stone lintel, and
an acanthus-leaf bridge. The man
holds prayer beads and the woman
a prayer book-attributes of their
faith. The wife appears to have
pausedfrom her reading in a moment
of contemplation. The sense
of suspended action was a recent
development in Flemish portraiture,
one with which Massys
may be credited. Left: Schloss
Au, Switzerland, Collection of
E. von Schulthess. Opposite:
19x 17 in. Bequest of Michael
Friedsam, 1931. The Friedsam
Collection (32.100.47)
to contemporary patrons as it is today;
Memling exploited it much more fully in numerous
other portraits in which the sitters are
depicted completely out of doors.
In this picture the columns, like the furlined
coat and jeweled rings, contribute to an
appropriately lofty surrounding, aggrandizing
the sitter's appearance and indicating his desire
for social prominence. Such decorous columns
are the first signs of a tradition that can
be traced through to the portraits of van Dyck
and Gainsborough and to the studio props of
early portrait photography.
A similar use of more ornate columns is
found in the Museum's arresting Portrait of a
Woman (fig. 34) by Quentin Massys. The columns
here form part of an arch that acts as a
repoussoir between the viewer and the pictorial
space. The arrangement derives ultimately
from the one seen first in Christus's Portrait of a
Carthusian and reflects a similar regard by the
artist for the framing device. In Massys's portrait,
however, the style of the architectural
motif, with its acanthus-leaf bridge, has been
brought up to date, reflecting the recent influence
in Flanders of Italianate designs. The
framing arch made possible the recognition of
this work as one of a pair of portraits of man
and wife. The husband's portrait (fig. 33), in
a Swiss private collection, is treated identical-
ly, so that when the paintings are juxtaposed,
the sitters appear to be behind a continuous
loggia.
The dating of portraits by Massys is problematic;
the most that can be said is that these
were painted in the second decade of the six-
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