VISION & MATERIAL

VISION & MATERIAL
Interaction between Art and Science in Jan van Eyck’s Time
Contributions to the BRUSSELS conference
held in 2010 at the Academy Palace
with a preface by Géry d’Ydewalle,
Laboratory of Experimental Psychology,
University of Leuven and Permanent
Secretary of the Royal Flemish Academy of
Belgium for Science and the Arts
edited by Marc De Mey, Maximiliaan P.J.
Martens and Cyriel Stroo
with articles by:
Inigo Bocken (Radboud University,
Nijmegen), Till-Holger Borchert (Groeninge
Museum, Bruges), Mark Clarke (Lisbon
University), Bruno Cornelis (Vrije Universiteit,
Brussels), Ingrid Daubechies (Duke
University, USA), Marc De Mey (Ghent
University), Dominique Deneffe (KIKIRPA,
Brussels), Ann Dooms (Vrije Universiteit,
Brussels), Bart Fransen (KIKIRPA, Brussels),
Ingrid Geelen (KIKIRPA, Brussels), Alan
Gilchrist (Rutgers University, USA), Jan
Koenderink (MIT, USA and universities of
Delft and Leuven), Maximiliaan P.J.
Martens (Ghent University), Aleksandra
Pižurica (Ghent University), Ljiljana Platiša
(Ghent University), Tijana Ružić (Ghent
University), Wolfgang Schneider
(Hildesheim University), Harald Schwaetzer
(Alanus Hochschule), Cyriel Stroo (KIKIRPA,
Brussels), Boris Uspenskij (National Research
University, Moscow), Abbie Vandivere
(Amsterdam University).
on the themes:
The viewers in the Ghent Altarpiece
Form and function of van Eyck’s portraiture
Changing drapery
Spatiogram features to characterize pearls
and beads
The lines and luster of the light
Painting techniques and human
representation in pre-Eyckian painting
The making of portraits before Jan van Eyck
Modeling splendor: applied brocade in the
Ghent Altarpiece, grayscale range in
pigment, paintings and perception & the eyes
in Jan van Eyck
The Belgian Royal Academies and the study
of the Ghent Altarpiece
Reflection as an object of vision in the Ghent
Altarpiece
Rogier’s St Luke Drawing the Virgin and
Cusanus epistemology
The composition of the Ghent Altarpiece.

On the jacket: Front and back together:
the detail (slightly enlarged) of the City
View from the Annunciation Scene of
Hubert and Jan van Eyck, The Adoration of
the Lamb (Ghent Altarpiece), closed
polyptych (width of the depicted view on
the original: 30,2 cm, on the jacket 34,2
cm)
Three barely visible viewers (6 mm in
height) at the city gate in the city view of
the Annunciation scene in the Ghent
Altarpiece face the divine light. They are
positioned in a horseshoe pattern and only
the fellow furthest in the street fully
captivates the light making his companion
in the middle visible through some
backlight and some reflected light from
the hidden side of the silhouetted fellow
who is nearest. The outline of the latter’s
face and chest is shown by the whitish line
indicating sideways shattered light. Vision
issues and optical sophistication belong to
Jan van Eyck’s favourite topics and
techniques. He is eager to represent
onlookers in a depicted scene as is evident
from the figures reflected in the mirror of
the Arnolfini Double Portrait (National
Gallery, London). Other paintings contain
them too, sometimes subtly hidden as in
the Bruges’ The Virgin and Child with
Canon Van der Paele. The three observers
in the back of the city scene of the Ghent
Altarpiece have been the subject of much
exploration at VLAC and were chosen as
the emblem for a 2010 conference on the
Eyckian fascination with vision
complementary to his penetrating
understanding of light’s interaction with
the surface of materials, hence the theme
and the title VISION & MATERIAL.
The achievement of the Ghent Altarpiece
coincides with Leon Battista Alberti’s
writing of De Pictura (On Painting), a
turning point in the history of art. The
treatise applies the late medieval science
of vision (optics) which Jan van Eyck
equally appears acquainted with, but
which he pursues in another direction than
Alberti. This collection contains
presentations at the Brussels VISION &
MATERIAL conference of 2010 that follow
through on the exploration of the theme
interaction between Art and Science in
Jan van Eyck’s Time.
The book VISION & MATERIAL published September 2012 by the Royal Flemish Academy of
Belgium comprises 332 pages format 22 x 29 on 150 g paper and is clothbound with an
illustrated jacket; it contains 180 illustrations, mostly full colour and many full page.
Plates and figures for the Ghent Altarpiece are based on the photographs taken during the
2010 extensive research campaign directed by professors Anne van Grevenstein (Amsterdam
University) and Ron Spronk (Queen’s University, Canada, and Radbout University, Nijmegen)
accessible via http://closertovaneyck.kikirpa.be.
Order on http://www.kvab.be/publicaties/boekdetail.aspx?id=2434