‘tis nogtans maar een schaduwe bij
het licht’:
the Wijts Triptych reconsidered
‘tis nogtans maar een schaduwe bij het licht’:
the Wijts Triptych reconsidered
Master Thesis History of Art (Curatorial) Faculty of Arts, University of Groningen
Name: Charlotte Wytema
Student number: s1916718
Supervisor: Dr. J.L. de Jong
Second reader: Prof. dr. A.S. Lehmann
Acknowledgements
The first time I laid eyes on the Wijts Triptych was in October 2014, when I was interning at the Groeningemuseum in Bruges as part of my master’s degree History of Art and Curatorial Studies at the University of Groningen. Chief curator and director Till-Holger Borchert had asked me to write a small educational text on the triptych, which was put on display for a short period of time, and I got hooked immediately. The more I looked at this mesmerizing work of art, the more questions sprang to mind, and before I knew it I had abandoned my previous ideas for a thesis topic and taken on the Wijts Triptych with its mysterious wing panels instead.
I am immensely grateful to Till-Holger Borchert for introducing me to the triptych, for allowing and encouraging me to take on the subject, and for all his helpful advice and unfailing support. Having been granted full access to the triptych and its extensive files in the Groeningemuseum has been crucial to my research, and I would very much like to thank Anne van Oosterwijk and Guenevere Souffreau for taking me to see the triptych in the museum’s transit depot and for answering all of my questions.
I would like to express my sincere gratitude to Sue Jones for sharing and encouraging my enthusiasm for the subject, and for taking the time to sit with me, and, with her wealth of knowledge on the subject, discuss the Wijts Triptych and its wing panels with me in depth. Our conversation has been very enriching, and has added much to the interpretations and comparisons in this thesis.
I am very grateful to dr. J.L. de Jong for his extraordinary supervision. His sharp and critical questions and comments, quick responses and encouragements have made the process of writing this thesis a very pleasant one, for which I am very grateful.
Table of Content
Acknowledgements………..3
Table of Content……….. 4
Introduction………6
Sources and documentation………. 7
Problem statement and research questions………. 8
Chapter 1 - Provenance………11
Petrus Wijts……….11
Nineteenth century………. 12
Twentieth and twenty-first centuries……….. 13
Chapter 2 - Historiography ………16
The Van Maelbeke Virgin in Ypres……….16
‘Onvulmaect’? The Van Maelbeke Virgin………..18
A close copy? The wing panels of the Wijts Triptych……….23
Chapter 3 - Materials, Technique and Condition ……….27
Support………..……….27 Frames………29 Paint Surface………..30 Technique………32 Chapter 4 - Description ……….. 35 Centre panel………35
Interior faces of the wing panels………38
Chapter 5 - Iconography ……….45
Biblical typology……….45
The wing panels: no antitype?………49
The imagery of the wing panels………..50
Chapter 6 - The Origin of the Wing Panels ……….. 56
Nineteenth-century forgeries?………56
Dating and context……….57
After Jan van Eyck?………58
Reconstruction………62
The wing panels added to the Van Maelbeke Virgin………..64
Conclusion ………68
Figures………70
Bibliography………..………….. 109
Appendix 1: References………116
Appendix 2: Conservation, restoration and examination history……….124
Appendix 3: Inscriptions………..131
Introduction
In 2007 the Groeningemuseum in Bruges added an exceptionally important and intriguing painting to its collection, when it acquired the Triptych of Petrus Wijts in a London auction. Commissioned 1
in the early seventeenth-century by Petrus Wijts (d. 1629), a canon of the collegiate Church of Saint Martin in Ypres, the arched-topped centre panel shows Wijts kneeling in front of the Virgin and Child within a loggia-like Romanesque enclosure. Each of its two wings shows, on its interior face, two scenes from the Old Testament, split over two registers. Inscriptions under each scene identify them as: on the left, the Burning Bush and Gideon’s Fleece; and on the right, Ezekiel’s Gate and Aaron’s Rod (Fig. 1-3). The wings’ exterior faces are painted in grisaille with depictions of the Tiburtine Sybil’s prophecy of the Ara Coeli to the Emperor Augustus (Fig. 4-5). Unfortunately, the triptych’s condition complicates our understanding and identification of this varied and unusual imagery, as significant parts have been overpainted or heavily restored, and the two lower scenes on the interior wings, respectively Gideon’s Fleece and Aaron’s Rod, are either heavily damaged or seem unfinished.
The Wijts Triptych’s centre panel was made around 1625 as a copy after Jan van Eyck’s famous last painting The Virgin and Child with a donor, commonly known as the Van Maelbeke
Virgin, which was commissioned by Nicolaas van Maelbeke (d. 1445), provost of the same Saint 2
Martin’s Church in Ypres from 1430 until his death in 1445. The Van Maelbeke Virgin was placed 3
in the church’s choir in 1445, where it remained continually for over three centuries and enjoyed international fame. During the French occupation of Ypres in the last decade of the eighteenth 4
century, however, the Van Maelbeke Virgin disappeared and it is now presumed lost. When, in the 5
early nineteenth century, the Wijts Triptych resurfaced, many believed that it was the lost van Eyck, while others thought it a copy after van Eyck. Ever since, the triptych, and especially the imagery on its centre panel, has been the subject of fervent debate among art historians. Only as a result of dendrochronological analysis undertaken on the centre panel in the 1970s was it finally proven that the Wijts Triptych was made during the early seventeenth century, and is thus not by the hand of van
Hereafter described as the Wijts Triptych.
1
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 60-61; Jones 1998, 45.
Eyck but a copy of his Van Maelbeke Virgin. When the Groeningemuseum had acquired the 6
triptych in 2007 and new dendrochronological analysis was carried out by Dr. Peter Klein, it was discovered that the wing panels predate the centre panel by more than a hundred years, as the trees from which they were cut were felled in the late fifteenth century at the latest. This is crucial 7
information since, as this paper will explore, it indicates that the wings may originally have been created as part of another ensemble, turning previous analyses on their heads. To this day, the historiography of the Wijts Triptych has focussed almost exclusively on the centre panel in relation to the Van Maelbeke Virgin; while what would now seem to be its earliest surviving elements have been largely overlooked.
Sources and documentation
Rather tantalizingly, even though the Van Maelbeke Virgin has been lost to art history, it is amongst the best documented of van Eyck’s paintings. Written accounts from as early as the sixteenth 8
century reveal that van Eyck’s painting was widely praised and admired. It was first mentioned in 1559 by the Ghent humanist and painter Lucas de Heere (1532-1584) in his Ode aan het Agnus Dei, as an ‘onvulmaecte’ (unfinished) painting by van Eyck in Ypres (see Appendix 1, no. 1). In the following decade, the Ghent humanist Marcus van Vaernewyck (1518-1569) mentioned the triptych in several of his writings. In his Den Spieghel der Nederlandscher Audthey (1568), he gives an extensive description of the triptych’s imagery: a Virgin and Child with a kneeling donor on the centre panel, and four scenes from the Old Testament symbolizing the Virgin’s purity, namely the Burning Bush, Gideon’s Fleece, Ezekiel’s Gate, and Aaron’s Rod, shown in two registers on wing panels that are ‘onvoldaen’ or unfinished (see Appendix 1, no. 4). The painting’s fame was not confined to Flanders however, but also reached Italy; it is mentioned in both Ludovico Guicciardini
Descrittione di tutti i Paesi Bassi (1567) and Giorgio Vasari’s famous Vite (1568; see Appendix 1,
nos. 5-6). That the painting also retained a certain prominence in later times is evinced by several mentions in the diaries of travelers to Ypres during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (see Appendix 1). Intriguingly though, none of these authors mentions the wing panels. When the Wijts
Triptych resurfaced in 1806, art historians began to write about its attribution, date, function,
patronage, iconography, and localisation; in the second half of the twentieth century, there were
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 59-61; dendrochronological analysis was undertaken by Prof. Munaut, and worked
6
out by Dr. Fletched in Oxford, 1974, see Appendix 2.
Report of Peter Klein, Zentrum Holzwirtschaft, Universität Hamburg, 14 April 2008 (files of the Groeningemuseum,
7
Bruges). Jones 1998, 26.
even two doctoral dissertations dedicated to the painting by Lieve Verheyden-van Overstraeten (1977) and Susan Jones (1998). 9
In addition to written sources, there are several visual accounts that shed light on the original appearance of the Van Maelbeke Virgin. Two fifteenth-century drawings in Nuremberg and Vienna (respectively in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum and Grafische Sammlung Albertina; Fig. 6-7), and Petrus Christus’ so-called Exeter Madonna in Berlin (Staatliche Museen Preussischer
Kulturbesitz, Gemäldegalerie; Fig. 8) are believed, among others, to reproduce the scene on the centre panel, but the Wijts Triptych is considered to be the closest copy of van Eyck’s last 10
painting. Painted almost two centuries after the Van Maelbeke Virgin, it is the only copy that 11
corresponds with van Vaernewyck’s description more closely and in more ways than any of the other surviving versions of the painting, as it displays both wing panels and the described imagery. In addition, the fact that the lower registers of the interior faces with the presumed scenes of Gideon’s Fleece and Aaron’s Rod seem to be unfinished, also appears to be in line with van
Vaernewyck’s descriptions, which specifically mention that the wings are unfinished, and de Heere, who speaks more generally of an unfinished picture (see Appendix 1, nos. 1-4). Van Vaernwyck makes no mention of the setting of the centre panel, which the anonymous painter constructed as a vaulted enclosure, but this feature does correspond to the two fifteenth-century drawings and the painting by Petrus Christus, which strongly suggests, in the absence of the original painting, that it followed a similar scheme. Crucially of course, the painter of the Wijts Triptych replaced the figure of Nicolaas van Maelbeke with that of Petrus Wijts, in whose canon’s staff the figures of Saint Peter and Saint Martin, respectively Wijts’ name saint and the Church’s patron saint, are clearly visible.
Problem statement and research questions
Van Vaernwyck is the first author to specifically mention and describe the wings of the Van
Maelbeke Virgin and their imagery; all of the later sources (see Appendix 1, nos. 7, 14-15) rely
heavily on his descriptions. Neither are the depictions on the wing panels included in any of the surviving copies. This seems strange when one considers that van Eyck’s paintings had such a wide-reaching influence over his contemporaries, and many of their compositional elements - including
See appendix 1 for a complete list of references on the Wijts Triptych; for the dissertations, see Verheyden-Van
9
Overstraeten 1977 and Jones 1998.
Other reproductions after the centre panel include the engraving Virgin and Child in a Church by an artist from the
10
circle of the Wierix brothers, 1580s or 1590s (Metropolitan Museum of Art), and the painting Virgin and Child with
Canon Franciscus de Mamez by Jan Thomas, 1645 (lost in the First World War); both are published in Jones 2006, fig.
2 and fig. 4.
Borchert 2010, 153-155.
the centre panel of the Van Maelbeke Virgin - were numerously copied and disseminated after his death.
In addition, the Wijts Triptych’s depiction of the four scenes from the Old Testament is highly unconventional and, as this thesis will demonstrate, two of the depicted scenes do not seem to correspond entirely with van Vaernewyck’s identification. Moreover, no other surviving late fifteenth- or early sixteenth-century panel paintings known to the author depict this combination of scenes together in the way the Wijts Triptych does. The results of its dendrochronological analyses 12
have raised important questions as to the chronology of the ensemble, while there are also
discrepancies in the condition of its various elements that further complicate the issue. The frames of the centre panel and the wings also differ: the centre panel is surrounded by a broad, moulded frame bearing a Latin inscription in Gothic majuscule dedicated to the Virgin Mary; the frames of the wing panels display less elaborate moulding, and their minimal inscriptions, in a kind of Gothic
textura quadrata, serve only to identify the scenes displayed above. Van Eyck’s use of multiple 13
letterforms on the framing elements of his paintings is in itself not unusual, but to include identifying inscriptions that appear to have little or no further symbolism and deeper layers of meaning - as those on the Wijts Triptych’s wing panels do not seem to have - is something that finds no parallels amongst his surviving works. Having such a clear stylistic separation between the wings and the central panel raises the important question whether the wings are a copy of others painted by Jan van Eyck that originally belonged to the Van Maelbeke Virgin.
The present study will explore the nature, function, and origins of the Wijts Triptych, through focussing not on the centre panel, but instead on its wing panels. Four questions will form the core structure of this paper: on what arguments are the current theories and assumptions surrounding the wing panels and their depictions based; to what extent are these theories and assumptions plausible and/or relevant; what is the origin of the wings of the Wijts Triptych; and are they indeed a copy after Jan van Eyck’s Van Maelbeke Virgin? Unravelling the Wijts Triptych as an object on its own terms, the present paper will start by examining the triptych’s provenance and historiography, offering a fuller interpretation of the surviving sources and a critical analysis of the existing literature. This will be followed by an examination of its physical properties, and a
thorough description of its imagery and iconography. The final chapter will focus on the origins, context, and possible function of the wing panels, offering a hypothetical reconstruction of their
Symbols of the Burning Bush, Gideon’s Fleece, Ezekiel’s Gate, and Aaron’s Rod do appear in the Annunciation scene
12
of Martin Schongauer’s Retable of the Dominicans in Musée Unterlinden, Colmar (inv.no. 88 R.P. 453), but alongside other Marian symbols in a more conventional manner.
For more informations about these letterforms, see Derolez, 2003, 74-74.
relation to contemporary events and the location in which they were housed. It will argue that the wing panels are not after a design by Jan van Eyck, that the Van Maelbeke Virgin was painted as a single, stand-alone panel painting, and that the wing panels of the Wijts Triptych were either made as early alterations of the Van Maelbeke Virgin or a closely related ensemble. While its scope will necessarily remain limited, suffering as it does from a limited timeframe and resources, it is the 14
aim of this paper to provide the first critical analysis of various aspects of the Wijts Triptych’s current state of historiography, its physical properties, and the true nature of its imagery, and thus to offer new avenues for future research.
Several fundamental issues remain with the present state of analysis; the triptych has been misidentified in the past
14
Chapter 1 - Provenance
Petrus Wijts
In 1786, Petrus Ramaut described in his Historie ofte beschrijving der Vermaerde Stadt van Ipre, a publication on the basis of older sources, that Petrus Wijts, canon of Saint Martin’s Church, had 15
passed away in Ypres on the 11th of October 1629, and was buried before the church’s altar of Our Lady, near to which a copy of the Van Maelbeke Virgin could be seen (see Appendix 1, no. 15). In addition, he stated that even though this copy is painted rather handsomely, it is still only ‘een schaduwe bij het licht’ (a shadow by the light) compared to the original displayed in the choir of the same church. This description is the first to mention that there existed a copy of the Van Maelbeke
Virgin, which was commissioned by Petrus Wijts. That this copy is in fact the Groeningemuseum’s 16 Wijts Triptych is confirmed by the two saints depicted on the donor’s staff: Saint Peter, Wijts’ name
saint, and Saint Martin, the patron saint of the church. In addition, the description provides us with valuable information concerning the triptych’s location and function: Wijts must have
commissioned it before he died as a commemorative painting that was to be placed near his grave before the altar of Our Lady in the Church of Saint Martin. In another reference from 1794, Ramaut is more specific about the triptych’s location as he describes that it was hung above the sitting area of the ‘autaerbewaerders’ (altar keepers) of the altar of Our Lady (see Appendix 1, no. 16-2).
Petrus Wijts (d. 1629) was born in Bruges, as the eldest son of the wealthy Jan Wijts (1524-1588), alderman of Bruges and a member of the Great Council of Flanders, and his wife Marie de Boodt. In 1592, Wijts obtained the second prebend for canon law at the Church of Saint 17
Martin in Ypres, was the chapter’s treasurer from 1601 until 1604, and became canon in 1605; a position he held until his death on October 12, 1629. His obit testified of his exceptional piety, 18
something that he also bounteously expressed during his lifetime: in 1623, he had endowed the 19
School of Saint Elizabeth in Ypres with a yearly sum of 3 livres, the following year he donated
See Jones 2006, 73, n. 1, 77, n. 25.
15
Ramaut makes no mention of wing panels on Wijts’ copy.
16
Jones 1998, 45; she mentions that Jan Wijts was alderman in Bruges in 1548-9 and in 1557-8.
17
Ibid: the provostship of the Church of Saint Martin was suppressed in 1559, when Pope Pius IV implemented in a
18
bull of March 11, 1560, that the church would become the cathedral church of the bishopric of Ypres; Verheyden-van Overstraeten mentions that Ramaut was wrong in describing that Wijts passed away on October 11, as in reality he died on October 12, see Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 19.
Jones 1998, 45; Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 19-20; his obit can be found in the cathedral archives:
19
money to provide for poor girls, in 1628 he provided an annual endowment of 36 livres to the benefit of the Symphony of Saint Martin’s, and he endowed several other charitable institutions in Ypres. Wijts founded an anniversary in 1625, and it is likely that he ordered the triptych around 20
this time. Wijts’ obit records even more charitable endowments, among others to the Ypres’ school 21
for poor boys, to the monastery at Roesbrugge, and to the altar of Our Lady in Saint Martin’s Church. In front of this altar Wijts would be buried, and the triptych would hang near to it.
Nineteenth century
There are no other records of the Wijts Triptych until 1806 when it was sold by Charles Walwein, treasurer of the Church Council of Saint Martin’s, to Daniel Bogaert-Dumortier (1777-1849) and Amand Charles Bogaert (1788-1855) of Bruges. When, after a publication by De Bast in 1824, it 22
had come to the attention of the Church Council that a triptych originally located in the their church by ‘Jan van Eyck ofte andere’ (Jan van Eyck or other) was now in a private collection in Bruges, they decided to take action and buy back the painting, feeling that the triptych was not only the property of the church, but of the whole town of Ypres. Armand Bogaert demanded a price of 23
30,000 francs, which was judged far too much for a copy, but too little for a van Eyck. Finally, no agreement was reached due to doubts about the triptych’s authenticity and it remained in the collection of the Bogaert family in Bruges. 24
In 1830, Amand Bogaert had the painting ‘scrubbed’ and restored, and in 1837 the triptych 25
was exhibited at the Exposition de Bruges 1837, as an original work by Jan van Eyck. Seven years 26
later, the triptych was inherited by Daniel Bogaert-Dumortier’s son, Alphonse Bogaert (1821-1869), who tried to sell it for a good price; he finally succeeded in 1856 when he sold it to collector Désiré van den Schrieck of Louvain (1786-1859) for 6,000 francs. Van den Schrieck then asked M. Héris, 27
a personal friend who had acted as an intermediary during the sale, to restore the triptych and in
Jones 1998, 45-46.
20
Jones 1998, 45, bases this on the results of dendrochronological analysis of the centre panel (see Appendix 2 for the
21
exact results).
Verheyden-van Overstraten 1977, 23; Jones 1998, 27.
22
Jones 1998, 27-28, 266.
23
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 23.
24
According to accounts by W.H.J. Weale, see Weale 1902, 2; Weale 1908, 103; Weale 1912, 142; Jones 1998, 266.
25
Jones 1998, 266.
26
Ibid.
1856, with the help of two other restorers, the centre panel was cradled, the frames were restored and their inner mouldings gilded, and new layers of varnish were applied (see Appendix 2). 28
When Van den Schrieck's renowned art collection was auctioned in 1861, the triptych was bought by his son-in-law, François Joseph Schollaert of Louvain (1816-1879). Schollaert, Vice-29
President of the Chamber of Representatives, exhibited the Wijts Triptych at an exhibition in Bruges in 1867. After he and then his wife passed away, their daughter Louise (1852-1930) and son-in-30
law Georges Helleputte of Kessel-Lo (1852-1925) inherited the painting in 1898. 31
Twentieth and twenty-first centuries
According to the art historian W.H.J. Weale, the triptych had hung too close to a stove when it was in the Schollaert collection, causing the panels to blister. This was presumably the reason why in 32
1901, Helleputte commissioned Louis Lampe to restore the painting (see Appendix 2), so that it would be ready in time to be shown at the groundbreaking 1902 Primitifs Flamands exhibition in Bruges, and two years later at the Guildhall in London; on both occasions the triptych was
presented as Jan van Eyck’s original Van Maelbeke Madonna. 33
During a meeting held on the 7th of January 1923, almost a hundred years after their last attempt, the Church Fabric of Saint Martin’s made clear their intentions to reacquire the triptych, then considered to be the original van Eyck, and to restitute it to its place of origin. They sent a letter to Helleputte, asking him to bequeath the triptych to the Church of Saint Martin in his will. 34
Unfortunately for the Church Fabric, their attempt failed; the painting was eventually sold by Louise Helleputte in 1929, four years after the death of her husband, to the art dealer Rochlitz in 35
Berlin. Rochlitz commissioned the restorer Böhnke in 1929 to restore the centre panel. Böhnke 36
Jones 1998, 39-40.
28
Schollaert bought the triptych for 1,600 francs at Van den Schrieck’s sale, which took place from the 8th until the 11th
29
of April, 1861; see Jones 1998, 267.
Tableaux de l'ancienne école Néerlandaise/Tentoonstellingscatalogus der eerste expositie der Vlaamse Primitieven te
30
Brugge. Bruges, la Grande Sale des Halles, Septembre 1867, no. 4.
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 27.
31
Ibid.
32
Bruges, Provinciaal Hof. Exposition des primitifs flamands et d'art ancien, June 15th to September 15th 1902, see
33
Weale 1902, 6-7, no. 14; London, Guildhall Art Gallery. Exhibition of works by Flemish and modern Belgian painters, May 3rd to July 28th 1906, see Temple 1906, 25, no. 7.
removed layers of overpaint, revealing an older, more ‘Eyckian’ portrait for the donor’s face (see Appendix 2). After the restoration, Rochlitz sold the triptych to the German banker Paul Bonn. 37
In the following period up until 1960, there are some gaps in the history of the Wijts
Triptych. It is unclear where Bonn kept the painting, but in 1930 it was probably sent via Paris to
New York, after which it was brought to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. At the end of the 38
1950s, the triptych was acquired by the British Earl of Warwick, who commissioned H. Böhm in Berlin in 1960-61 to restore the painting and remove all overpaint (Appendix 2). The triptych was briefly exhibited at Agnew’s Gallery in London, after which it returned to the chapel at Warwick Castle. In 1974, the Earl of Warwick sent the triptych to Brussels, having it meticulously 39
researched, and it was there that dendrochronological evidence finally put an end to the question whether it was van Eyck’s Van Maelbeke Virgin or a copy. It revealed that the centre panel was painted in between 1620 and 1635 and thus could not possibly be by van Eyck (see Appendix 2).
When this had become clear, the Earl of Warwick’s intermediary, T.P. Grange, contacted the City of Ypres and the Belgian Ministry of Culture, offering the triptych for sale, while keeping the recent findings quiet in the first instance. History repeated itself: the requested sum was 40
considered too high for a copy, but too low for an original van Eyck, and in order to solve the case once and for all, the Belgian Minister of Culture asked the Royal Committee for Monuments and Landscapes on the 6th of November 1975 to research the authenticity of the Wijts Triptych (then known as the ‘Warwick Triptych’), and appointed Prof. Dr. Jan Karel Steppe as chairman. 41
Ultimately, Grange gave the committee permission to view the dendrochronological report
composed in 1974, and after a careful study of the historiography and the iconographical details of the triptych, the committee concluded that the triptych was not the original Van Maelbeke Virgin, but an early seventeenth-century copy, pointing out the painting’s critical documentary value. 42
Neither the City of Ypres, nor the Belgian State bought the painting, and eventually the triptych was put up for auction by the Earl of Warwick at Christie’s London in 1980, where it was bought by a 43
Jones 1998, 268.
37
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 28; An article in The New York Times from March 14 1930 headed: ‘$600,000
38
PAINTING TO BE EXHIBITED HERE; Van Eyck's "Madonna of Ypres," Executed in 1441, to Be Put on Display Tomorrow.’ Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 29. 39 Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 30. 40 Ibid. 41 Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 30-31. 42
Christie’s London, Old Master Paintings, Friday 11th July, 1980, lot no. 106.
British private collector. After almost 30 years, the Wijts Triptych resurfaced in 2007 when it was again put up for auction at Christie’s London, and was bought by the Groeningemuseum in 44
Bruges, where it now can be admired, questioned, and enjoyed by visitors from all over the world.
Christie’s London, Old Master and British Picture Day Sale, Friday 6th of July, 2007, lot 107.
Chapter 2 - Historiography
The Van Maelbeke Virgin in Ypres
Jan van Eyck’s Van Maelbeke Virgin was first mentioned in the sixteenth century by Lucas de Heere, and again shortly after by Marcus van Vaernewyck who described the painting’s location and imagery (see Appendix 1, nos. 1-4). Miraculously, the painting survived the iconoclastic disruptions that occurred in Ypres in 1566 and 1578, as it was presumably hidden, and by 1614 it seems to 45
have been reinstalled in the church because of an account made in that year by Johann Ernst, Duke of Saxe-Weimar, who specifically mentions a painting by van Eyck in Saint Martin’s Church, although this record remains problematic (see Appendix 1, no. 8). However, it is only in 1641 that 46
the first mention of the painting’s location within the church was given by Antonio Sanderus, who stated that the van Eyck stood in the choir (see Appendix 1, no. 9). That this painting’s donor was provost Nicolaas van Maelbeke came to light in the following century, when an anonymous British traveller transcribed a Latin inscription running around its frame in 1720, of which the first line translates as ‘here lies Mr Nicolaus Migena, once incumbent of this church’ (see Appendix 1, no. 12). This inscription also reveals the painting’s function; ‘here lies’ indicates that this ‘Nicolaus 47
Migena’ (Nicolaas van Maelbeke) lay buried in the vicinity of the painting, giving the Van
Maelbeke Virgin a commemorative function. This is further specified in two descriptions written by
Petrus Ramaut in 1768 and 1794 (but which go back to even older sources), mentioning that the 48
painting indeed hung in front of Nicolaas van Maelbeke’s grave in the church’s choir (see appendix 1, nos. 15-16). Although there is no record proving the painting stood in the choir before 1614, the 49
inscriptions mention that the painting hung within close proximity to Van Maelbeke’s tomb which
Jones 2006, 79.
45
Ibid.; Johann Ernst does not describe the same picture as van Vaernewyck, as he talks about a life-size Annunciation
46
by the famous painter Jan van Eyck underneath the Church’s organ. No other source mentions this scene in the context of van Eyck or Saint Martin’s Church, but since he specifically mentions the Bruges painter and that the work was ‘vor ein grosz Kunstsstück gehalten’ (held in high regard), it is likely that there was a work present by van Eyck in the church at that time.
According to Jones, the name Nicolaus Migena is a Latinized and greatly worn form of the name Nicolaas van
47
Maelbeke, see Jones 1998, 73. Another Latinized name for Van Maelbeke is ‘Malchalopie’, which occurs in the descriptions by Ramaut (Appendix 1, no. 15 and 16). For a comparison of this inscription to other inscriptions by van Eyck, see Jones 1998, 74.
Jones 2006, 77, n. 26.
48
Jones 1998, 35; The Van Maelbeke Virgin thus had the same function as van Eyck’s Madonna with the Joris van der
49
makes it is highly likely that this was the painting’s original location. In both accounts, Ramaut 50
also mentions that a copy of the Van Maelbeke Virgin, which we now know is the Wijts Triptych, can be seen near the Altar of Our Lady. The Van Maelbeke Virgin must have remained in its place until the choir was modernized between 1756-1760 (in his 1794 account, Ramaut mentions that it was removed from the choir when the walls were lined with marble) and the painting was taken to the bishop’s palace, where it was lost, presumably during the French occupation of Ypres in 1794. 51
For over three hundred years, the Van Maelbeke Virgin functioned as a potent symbol of the institutional continuity of Saint Martin’s Church. It reasserted the role and prominence of the Chapter and it graced the church’s choir with the likeness of an eminent member of the previous institution of provostship. Nicolaas van Maelbeke was first recorded as a canon of Saint Martin’s 52
Church in Ypres in 1425, and became pastor in 1428. From 1430 until his death in 1445, he held 53
the provostship, which comprised the church and monastery, and had secular jurisdiction over the lands of Saint Martin’s both inside and outside the town of Ypres. After a somewhat unstable 54
period, Nicolaas van Maelbeke’s rule brought harmony, prosperity and stability to the foundation and to the people of Ypres. 55
’Onvulmaect’? The Van Maelbeke Virgin
The earliest mention of the Van Maelbeke Triptych known to us was made more than a century after the painting’s execution, by the Ghent painter Lukas de Heere (1534-1584). In his Ode (1559), a poem dedicated to the Ghent Altarpiece and published in his 1565 Den Hof en boomgaard der
poësien, de Heere mentions that paintings by Jan van Eyck were ‘in high demand in all regions’, 56
and that in addition to Ghent, works by the Bruges master were also to be found in Bruges and
That is considering that the inscription that the anonymous British traveller described, was indeed the original
50
inscription applied by Jan van Eyck. For more information about the Van Maelbeke Virgin’s original location, see Jones 1998, 78, and Jones 2006, 79.
Jones 1998, 31; Jones 2006, 73, n. 1.
51
Jones 2006, 80.
52
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 15; Jones 1998, 60.
53
Jones 1998, 60.
54
Jones 1998, 61-62
55
Weale mentions that the only copy of Den Hof en boomgaard der poësien is preserved in the University of Ghent, and
56
Ypres (see Appendix 1, no. 1). When referring to van Eyck’s painting in Ypres, de Heere mentions 57
a key detail: ‘Ende t’Ypre ooc een onvolmaecte zomen siet’ (and in Ypres also an unfinished [painting] as one sees), indicating that the Van Maelbeke Virgin had in some way been left incomplete by the painter.
The same statement was made several times by the Ghent humanist Marcus van Vaernewyck (1518-1569) in the 1560s (Appendix 1, no. 2-4); firstly when he described the churches of Ypres in his Nieu Tractaet en curte bescrijvinghe van dat Edel Graefschap van Vlaenderen (1563), in which he mentions an ‘onvulmaect tafereel’ (unfinished painting) by Jan van Eyck, and secondly when 58
talking about the 1566 outbreaks of iconoclasm in the Church of Saint Martin in Ypres in his Van
die beroerlicke Tijden in die Nederlanden, en voornamelick in Ghendt 1566-1568 (1566), in which
he wonders whether the picture that van Eyck had painted, ‘maer niet vuldaen en heeft’ (but did not finish), had been damaged. It is here that not only the location of the painting, the ‘Sente Martins keercke’, and the occupation of the donor, ‘eenen abt’, are revealed, but the imagery of the Van
Maelbeke Virgin is also described for the first time: ‘de figuren vander maechdelicheijt van onser
lieve vrauwe wesende, een Marie beelde ende eenen abt daer voren biddende int midden’ (the figures of virginity of Our Lady, an image of Mary and an abt praying in front of her in the middle’) adding that this ‘consich weerck alle schilderien te boven ghaet' (incredible work surpasses all other paintings). Here van Vaernewyck not only describes the centre panel’s depiction of the Virgin and Child with the kneeling donor, but also mentions figures that embody Mary’s virginity, alluding to the imagery of the wing panels that he describes extensively in his 1568 Den Spieghel der
Nederlandscher Audtheyt. In this publication, he sets out that each wing displays two scenes
referring to the Virgin's purity, namely the Burning Bush, Gideon’s Fleece, Ezekiel’s Gate, and 59
Aaron’s Rod, and further reveals the extent to which the painting is unfinished, specifically mentioning that the wings are ‘onvuldaen’ (incomplete; see Appendix 1, no. 4). According to van Vaernewyck, the painting is well worth seeing as it was painted by Jan van Eyck, who’s work ‘meer hemelsh dan meinschelic schijnt’ (appears more heavenly than human). It is important to note that
De Heere here referred to the two other well-known, large works by van Eyck, at that time also residing in churches:
57
the Madonna with Canon Joris van der Paele in the church of Saint Donatius in Bruges (now in the Groeningemuseum, Musea Brugge, Bruges, inv.no 0000.GRO0161.I), and the Van Maelbeke Virgin in Saint Martin’s Church in Ypres, which means that the three capital cities of Flanders had a painting by Jan van Eyck in their midst.
Van Vaernewyck does not mention the name of the church, using ‘proostye’ instead (provostship); Jones argues
58
convincingly that he most likely refers to the Saint Martin’s Church; when the foundation of the Diocese of Ypres was founded in 1559, the provostship was suppressed, but as the monastic structure was still standing it is likely that the term was still used, see Jones 1998, 31-32.
Van Vaernewyck uses the words ‘bernenden Eglentier’ (burning Eglantine), specifically referring to a certain type or
59
van Vaernewyck completed this text in 1561, and updated it in 1565 before it was published in 1568; it is unclear when exactly he wrote about, and possibly saw, the wing panels. 60
From de Heere's and van Vaernewyck’s testimonies, it becomes clear that already a century after his death in 1441, Jan van Eyck was a renowned painter whose works were highly respected. Although he was considered an artist ‘van ouden tye’ (of the old times; van Vaernewyck, 1563), his works were still ‘ghesocht uut alle landauwen’ (in high demand in all regions; De Heere, 1559). The fact that van Vaernewyck of Ghent, when describing the iconoclasm in Flanders, only specifically mentions the Van Maelbeke Virgin when describing the events in Ypres, is exemplary for the exceptional esteem the Van Maelbeke Virgin was held in. Remarks of the painting’s fame were not confined to Flanders but reached an Italian audience; Ludovico Guicciardini, a Florentine merchant and writer based in Antwerp, described the painting in his 1567 Descrittione di tutti i Paesi Bassi, as ‘Ancora a Ipri n’è un’altra bella & memorabile’ (also in Ypres, there is another and memorable one), and Giorgio Vasari mentioned in his famous Vite (1568) that there are works by van Eyck’s hand in Ghent, Ypres, and Bruges (see Appendix 1, no. 5-6). Judging from the abundance of surviving sixteenth century sources in which van Eyck’s Ypres painting was mentioned, it must have offered a certain amount of public access.
By describing the Van Maelbeke Virgin as ‘unvulmaect’, ‘niet vuldaen’, and ‘onvuldaen’, de Heere and van Vaernewyck mention a crucial detail about the painting’s original appearance, which is of vital importance in regard to the origin of the Wijts Triptych. Up until the present day, many art historians have interpreted those terms as describing a picture not completely finished in some way; most follow van Vaernewyck in stating that the scenes on the wing panels are unfinished, while others believe that in addition, parts of the centre panel were also incomplete, a theory
simultaneously encouraged and problematised by the present appearance of the badly damaged and extensively treated triptych. However, it is worth considering that both interpretations could be wrong, and that De Heere's and Van Vaernwyck’s accounts had a completely different meaning. Perhaps the painting was merely less detailed in handling than other works by van Eyck known to these authors, or it had been given blank wing panels. Maybe ‘onvulmaect’ indicated that the 61
frame’s paint layers, inscriptions or decorations were unfinished, that its gilding was relatively 62
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 9.
60
Jones 2006, 77, n. 24.
61
The Wijts Triptych does not bare an inscription on the lower rails; it is possible that, if the triptych is a true copy of the
62
Van Maelbeke Virgin, that the latter also didn’t have an inscription on the frame’s lower rails. However, Jones pointed
minimal, or that the construction of the object and its mounting within the church itself was incomplete or unresolved. It is interesting to note that none of the seventeenth and eighteenth 63
century descriptions of the painting reiterate the idea that it was unfinished (see Appendix 1), which could indicate that it was never ‘onvulmaect’ in the first place, or perhaps that it was finished by another hand at this point. 64
In order to interpret ‘onvulmaect’ correctly, and to establish how trustworthy their accounts of the painting are, it is important to consider whether de Heere and van Vaernewyck could have seen the Van Maelbeke Virgin in person. That de Heere knew the Ghent Altarpiece very well is evident from his Ode to the polyptych, but it is not clear if he ever saw the Ypres picture himself; records indicate that he traveled to several cities and countries, but there is no mention or evidence that he visited Ypres. Van Vaernewyck, also a native of Ghent, must similarly have been familiar 65
with the exceptional quality of works by van Eyck. Since he gives a specific description of the painting, this might indicate that he indeed saw the Van Maelbeke Virgin. Jones argues that he could have seen the painting, since he mentions that ‘it is well worth seeing’. In addition, Verheyden-van 66
Overstraeten points out that he only briefly describes the Madonna with Joris van der Paele in Bruges, while discussing the Van Maelbeke Virgin in more extensive detail. This, however, does not necessarily indicate that he saw the painting himself; considering the fact that the painting was already very well known, he could easily have copied another author’s account. A study of van Vaernewyck’s life and travels, focusing on the extent to which his chronicles are verifiable, would shed more light on the actualities of his movements. Considering how faithful his rendition of ‘unvolmaect’ and his description of the wings panels are, is especially important in regard to the question of how close a copy the Wijts Triptych is. The fact, however, that van Vaernewyck
mentions the imagery of the wing panels in both his 1566 and 1568 publications, makes it likely for the purposes of this paper that he can be considered a reliable source.
After the Wijts Triptych resurfaced in Bruges in the early nineteenth century, its attribution was heavily debated. Some believed that the triptych could not possibly be by the hand of van Eyck
I am grateful to Sue Jones for discussing this with me.
63
Besides Karel van Mander (1604) and Petrus Ramaut (1768) who reconstitute van Vaernewyck’s 1568 description,
64
and Descamps (1753), who takes used van Mander’s description as his main source (see Appendix 1, nos. 7, 14-15). Records indicate that he was born and raised in Ghent, studied painting under Frans Floris in Antwerp, returned to
65
Ghent where he lived and worked until the Duke of Alva came to the Low Lands, after which the protestant de Heere was exiled to England; upon his return to Ghent after the Pacification, he is know to have traveled to France and Middelburg; see De Heere 1969 (1565), X-XIV.
Jones 1998, 31.
and must therefore be a copy, or a painting from Saint Martin’s misattributed to van Eyck. 67 68
Others were convinced that it was indeed by Jan van Eyck, or at least that there was an original 69
van Eyck below the visible surface. In addition, the sixteenth-century notions that the Van 70 Maelbeke Virgin was left unfinished led to the almost unanimous assumption that it was Jan van
Eyck’s last painting; many believed that van Eyck left the painting incomplete upon his death, after which it was finished by his workshop, or more specifically, by his brother Lambert, who was still 71
alive when Jan passed away. This, however, seems improbable, not only due to the lack of 72
surviving pictures and archival documents concerning Lambert, but also because Jan van Eyck, who as court painter to Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, was already held in high regard during his own lifetime, would surely have been working on more than one commission at the time, since he operated a large and productive workshop.
It is thus highly unlikely that van Eyck’s Van Maelbeke Virgin would have been left
unfinished on purpose. In addition to the sixteenth century records of its ‘onvulmaect’ state, one of the main arguments for it being unfinished is that the two surviving fifteenth-century drawn copies reproduce the centre panel in its unfinished state, since they each miss out the same, seemingly unfinished elements of the composition (Fig. 6-7). However, Maryan Ainsworth has shown that 73
these two drawings resemble a standard workshop activity, namely the recording of finished or nearly finished compositions that could later serve as models for new compositions; in addition, 74
Jones has pointed out that the drawings also could have been taken from an intermediate pattern drawing that left out subsidiary features, something that is also displayed in other drawings from the period. In her 2006 publication, Jones convincingly rejects the assumption that the Van Maelbeke 75 Virgin went to Ypres in an unfinished state. After mentioning the abundance of Eyckian detail in 76
For example: Passavant 1833, 367-369; Michiels 1846, 100; Hotho 1858, 205-208; Crowe and Cavalcaselle 1862,
67
102; Hulin de Loo 1902, 4; Renders 1933, 147-155.
For example: Schnaase 1879, 149-151. Kaemmerer 1898, 98-99 and Voll 1906, 264, even called it a forgery.
68
For example: Weale 1899, 408-10; Weale 1908, 95-103; Van Puyvelde 1930, 3-9; Winkler 1929, 490-484; Hulin de
69
Loo 1940-42, 12-13; Trio 2007, 4.
For example: Friedländer 1903, 68-69; Friedländer 1929, 432-3; Dochy 1930, 198; Friedländer 1967, 64-65.
70
Borchert and van Oosterwijk 2008, 9-10; Borchert 2010, 155.
71
Carton 1848, 73-74; Waagen 1862, 90-92; however, Schnaase 1879, 150 questions this statement, as he points out
72
that there is no clear evidence whatsoever that indicates that Lambert finished this painting.
Weale 1899, 2; Weale 1908, 100-101; Borchert and van Oosterwijk 2008, 31; Borchert 2010, 155.
73
Ainsworth and Martens 1994, 182.
74
Jones 2006, 73; see also Jones 2000, 197-198.
75
Jones 2006, 74-76.
the centre panel of the Wijts Triptych, she points out that the anonymous British traveler described the work in detail: ‘the more one looks at it ye more work one discovers as many beasts of all sorts running thro a wood that makes ye Landskip of the Piece’ (1720; see Appendix 1, no. 12); a 77
second British traveler, possibly John Ratcliff, wrote that ‘the faces & Landscapes are such as a good modern painter might not be asham’d of’, which does not recall an unfinished painting (1734; see Appendix no. 13). Both Englishmen also recount that the painting carries the inscription of the date 1441, which possibly indicates that it was finished before van Eyck’s death; Jones adds, 78
however, that the date needs not necessarily have been painted last, which does not eliminate the possibility that van Eyck’s workshop assistants might have finished the painting after the artists death. Since there is evidence that van Eyck’s workshop continued to produce high quality work 79
after the master’s demise, this makes it highly implausible that the painting would have been installed in Saint Martin’s Church while it was not yet finished. 80
A close copy? The wing panels of the Wijts Triptych
Recent studies have convincingly demonstrated that the centre panel of the Wijts Triptych is a relatively accurate copy of van Eyck’s Van Maelbeke Virgin. However, the wing panels of the 81 Wijts Triptych remain shrouded in mystery as they have never been exhaustively studied. Due to
their imagery, style, and condition, the paintings on the wings are highly unusual, and have spawned a wide spectrum of theories. Many scholars have considered them copies of the Van Maelbeke
Virgin’s wing panels originally painted by van Eyck, while others argue that they have no 82
connection to van Eyck at all. To try and pick apart these opposing arguments, it is crucial to 83
ascertain whether the Van Maelbeke Virgin had wing panels in the first place, and if so, what form their imagery took, and if they were indeed ‘unfinished’. In order to do this, a critical
Jones 2006, 76.
77
The inscription from 1734 mentions the date as ‘1001’, but Jones argues convincingly that this stands for ‘1441’, and
78
that is was transcribed in a similar manner to the date signed by van Eyck on his Madonna with Canon van der Paele in Bruges, see Jones 2006, 74-76.
Jones 2006, 76.
79
Ibid.
80
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 94-102; Jones 1998, 26-95.
81
Martin 1903, 12; Winkler 1927, 492; Steinbart 1929, 263-264; Van Puyvelde 1930, 3; Philipp 1971, 201-212;
82
Borchert and van Oosterwijk 2008, 7.
Durand-Gréville 1902, 84; Baldass 1952, 279; Panofsky 1953, 190; Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 99, 103; Jones
83
reconsideration of the references to the Van Maelbeke Virgin from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries with regards to its wing panels is necessary and overdue.
Van Vaernewyck is the first to mention the imagery of the wing panels in 1566 and,
subsequently, to specifically mention them as being ‘unfinished’ and to describe their imagery more extensively in his 1568 publication (see Appendix 1, no. 4). His description seems to correspond exactly with the wings panels of the Wijts Triptych, which is one of the main reasons why the triptych was long thought to be the Van Maelbeke Virgin. However, van Vaernewyck only describes the four scenes from the Old Testament depicted on the wing’s interior faces, and makes no mention of the scenes on the exterior sides, those jointly depicting the Tiburtine Sibyl’s prophecy to the Emperor Augustus. An almost identical description of ‘unfinished’ wing panels was given in Karel 84
van Mander’s famous Schilder-Boeck from 1604 (see Appendix 1, no. 7); however, when comparing the two texts, it becomes clear that van Mander simply lifted his account from van Vaernewyck’s document and it is therefore likely that he did not see it in person. In turn, van Mander’s description of the Van Maelbeke Virgin was used in 1753 by Jean-Baptiste Descamps in his La Vie des Peintres Flamands, for which he mainly translated the earlier publications by van Mander and Arnold Houbraken into French (see Appendix 1, no. 14); it is consequently also likely that Descamps had not seen van Eyck’s painting in Ypres either. The same text passage by van Vaernewyck was also amost identically taken over by Petrus Ramaut in his 1768 publication (see Appendix 1, no. 15.1; Ramaut is known to have taken over passages of van Vaernewyck’s accounts more frequently). 85
Ten years after van Mander’s Schilder-Boeck was first published, Johann Ernst the Younger, Duke of Saxe-Weimar (1594-1626), travelled through the Low Countries, France and England, and visited Saint Martin’s Church in Ypres on January 24th 1614. His description of van Eyck’s painting is unlike any of the other accounts, as he writes that ‘unter der Orgel stehet der Englische Grusz in natürlicher grösse abgemahlet / welches des berühmbten Mahlers Johann von Eicken Hand seyn soll / wird vor ein grosz Kunststück gehalten’ (‘beneath the organ stands the life-size Annunciation, which is by the hand of the famous painter Jan van Eyck, and held in high regard’; see Appendix 1,
It is interesting to consider that van Vaernewyck only describes their interior faces; what could be described might
84
have been affected by the access and/or the sight lines of the altarpiece that visitors were afforded. As Jones has demonstrated, the Van Maelbeke Virgin hung in the choir of Saint Martin’s Church, which was usually only accessible to members of the chapter and closed off to the parishioners. If it was indeed a triptych at the time, whoever saw it may only have been able to see the interior faces of the wings if the triptych was opened. Even if the visitor (van
Vaernewyck, or the person who provided him with information on the Van Maelbeke Virgin) was allowed into the choir to see the painting up close, he may not have been able to see the exterior faces properly, or at all, when the triptych was opened, as van Eyck’s picture may have been positioned against the a series of blind arched niches that decorated the lowest levels of the choir’s circumference walls; see Jones 2006, 78-79.
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 14.
no. 8). This passage raises many questions. It is possible that the duke confused the Van Maelbeke
Virgin’s main subject of the kneeling donor in front of the Virgin and Child with an Annunciation
scene, although it seems highly unlikely that such an educated individual would confuse scenes that were so commonly known and often depicted. Jones notes that it is also possible the wing paintings of van Eyck’s picture had a scene of the Annunciation on their exterior faces, which were then replaced with the scene of the Tiburtine Sibyl and Emperor Augustus; however, she adds that this too is unlikely since the Duke does not mention that van Eyck’s painting is a triptych. If it was indeed a triptych, it would most likely have been opened for an important visitor such as Johann Ernst. Considering the other accounts of the painting, which describe a kneeling donor in front of 86
the Virgin and Child, the copy drawings of the centre panel, and the fact that the Van Maelbeke
Virgin was presumably positioned in the choir, the most likely explanation for this peculiar 87
description is that Johann Ernst must have confused or conflated van Eyck’s painting with another positioned underneath the organ and depicting the Annunciation.
It is remarkable that none of the seventeenth- or eighteenth-century sources, besides van Mander (1604), Descamps (1753) and Ramaut (1768), mention that van Eyck’s picture had wing panels or describe it as unfinished. In 1714, Sieur Nomis wrote that the painting by van Eyck was ‘… ce rare tableau qui est dans une espèce d’armoire’ (a rare picture that is in some kind of cabinet; see Appendix 1, no. 10). Jones interpreted this as evidence that van Eyck’s lost painting did in fact 88
have wings. However, it is much more likely that Sieur Nomis used ‘une espèce d’armoire’ to 89
describe some sort of wooden construction that would have been put around the painting for its protection, which would not have been an unusual thing to do. That Saint Martin’s Church highly 90
valued the painting, becomes clear from the fact that all eighteenth-century accounts of the Van
Maelbeke Virgin state that Jan van Eyck was the first to paint in oil, and Martène and Durand even
specifically mention in 1717 that they saw the first painting made in oil since ‘Monsieur Van-der-Meech chanoine et archiprêtre nous faisoit remarquer tout cela’ (‘Mister Van-der-Meesch, canon
Jones 1998, 35.
86
For more information on its exact location, see Jones 2006, 77-80.
87
Sieur Nomis does not call Jan van Eyck by his exact name but mentions that the painting is attributed to ‘Franecus ou
88
Francque’, which, when spoken out loud, sounds like ‘van Eyck’. In addition, he mentions that this painting was ‘la première a l’huile’, which is something that apparently must have been told to visitors who came to see the Van
Maelbeke Virgin, as this statement was also described by Martène and Durand (1717), and the two British travelers
(1720 and 1734), see Appendix 1, no. 11-13. Jones 1998, 32.
89
Something similar had happened to van Eyck’s Madonna with Canon van der Paele in Bruges; when the Saint
90
and parish priest, has pointed that out to us’; see Appendix 1, no. 11). Someone from the church must have specifically shown visitors the Van Maelbeke Virgin while telling them about it,
underlining the importance of the painting to the church and making it seem only logical that they would have tried to conserve it by putting a protective construction around it.
Looking critically at two other eighteenth-century accounts of the Van Maelbeke Virgin, the absence of wing panels becomes even more striking. In 1720, the anonymous British traveller describes the scene on the centre panel as ‘The Virgin Mary with our Saviour in her Arm & this Inscription …’ (Appendix 1, no. 12), after which he gives an account of the detailed landscape in the background, and in 1734, another British traveller, possibly John Ratcliff, describes the scene on the centre panel even more extensively: ‘It represents a Provost of the Ch[urch] …in supplicat[io]n to ye V. Mary w[i]th an infant Xt in her arms’, followed by a remark of the superb quality of the faces and the landscape (see Appendix 1, no. 13). The fact that both Englishmen do not mention wing panels does not exclude the possibility that the Van Maelbeke Virgin had wings, but it seems highly likely that two independent accounts, both paying particular attention to finer details of the painting, would have mentioned and described wing panels if they existed.
The fact that the surviving copies of van Eyck’s painting only display the imagery of its centre panel (Fig. 6-8), and that there are no other copies or records found of the Wijts Triptych’s wing panels, strongly suggests that the Van Maelbeke Virgin was painted not as a triptych but as a single memorial panel, in a manner similar to van Eyck’s Madonna with Canon Joris van der Paele in Bruges. However, one cannot simply ignore the accounts of Marcus van Vaernewyck (in 1566 and 1568), who is the only independent source for the presence of the wings. The only others who specifically mention wing panels - van Mander (in 1604), Descamps (in 1753) and Ramaut (1768) - merely repeat his text. It is possible that the wings were added later to the Van Maelbeke Virgin, possibly still in the fifteenth- or perhaps in the sixteenth century, and that they were not
‘unvolmaect’, but merely less detailed in comparison to the overtly ‘Eyckian’ centre panel. 91
Moreover, the recent outcome of the dendrochronological analysis, indicating that the wing panels of the Wijts Triptych were painted at the end of the fifteenth or beginning of the sixteenth century, could also indicate that the Wijts Triptych’s wings are the ones van Vaernewyck saw on the Van
Maelbeke Virgin. Many questions remain: if this is true, why would wing panels be added later to
van Eyck’s picture? What was their origin? And why were wings attached that were ‘unfinished’? Critically looking at the materiality and the iconography of the Wijts Triptych and its wing panels,
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 99; Jones 2006, 76-77.
Chapter 3 - Materials, technique, and condition
Support
As has already been pointed out in the introduction, questions will remain because of the issues with the current state of the triptych’s analysis. Nevertheless, important things can be gained from what has been found out about the triptych in the past, and from a critical and close examination of the Wijts Triptych’s physical state. Its materials, technique, and condition are subjects crucial for our understanding of the relationship between the centre panel and the wings. By closely examining 92
the physical properties of the wing panels, it is my aim to give a clear overview of the triptych’s physical state and issues.
The triptych is of a substantial size: the arched centre panel measures 177.2 x 99.7 cm (198 x 124 cm including its frame) and consists of five vertically laid boards with a vertical grain; each measuring circa 20.5 cm wide, except for the board on the far left, which measures circa 15.5 cm. In contrast, each wing panel is composed of only one single, tall plank, aligned with its grain running vertically. The left panel measures 173 x 41.2 cm (189.1 x 55.8 cm including its frame) and the right 173 x 41 cm (189.2 x 56.5 cm including its frame). The reverse and obverse faces of both 93
panels are completely covered in paint. The centre panel’s support has been entirely thinned and cradled on the reverse; the planks each retain a thickness of 7 to10 mm. The boards of the wing 94
panels are even thinner, as they measure only circa 5 mm in depth.
Dendrochronological analysis undertaken by Dr. Peter Klein on the centre panel indicated that the wood is oak of Baltic origin, and revealed that the earliest heartwood ring of the youngest plank grew in 1604. Taking into account the sapwood statistics of eastern Europe (with a median 95
of 15 sapwood rings and two years of seasoning), an earliest felling date of between 1613 and 1623 can be proposed, with a likely creation date from 1621 onwards. There is no barbe visible; it is 96
possible that the unpainted edges of the support were sawn off when the painting was thinned and
See appendix 2 for a compete overview of the triptych’s conservation and restoration history. See also Verheyden-van
92
Overstraeten 1977, 52-61; Deneckere e.a. 2010, 1500-1508. This is indicated from the viewpoint of the beholder.
93
This was executed in 1856 by De Heuvel, see Appendix 2.
94
Report of Peter Klein, Zentrum Holzwirtschaft, Universität Hamburg, 14 April 2008 (files of the Groeningemuseum,
95
Bruges).
Ibid.; for more information regarding dendrochronological analysis, see Peter Klein, ‘Dendrochronological Analysis
96
of Netherlandish Paintings,’ in Molly Faries and Ron Spronk (ed.), Technical Examination of Early Netherlandish
cradled, but in order to establish this, the painting needs to be closely examined out of its frame, 97
something not currently possible. Dendrochronology by Dr. Klein on the wing panels, however, revealed an entirely different age than the centre panel; both wing panels were cut from the an older Baltic oak tree than the centre panel, and revealed sequences of 218 and 227 growth rings, with the latest growth ring of 1466 on the left panel and 1478 on the right panel. Dr. Klein suggested that the earliest possible felling date for the inner timber was 1487, and proposed a likely creation date for the painting of 1495 onwards. On both of the wing’s interior and exterior faces, a barbe is clearly 98
visible that lines up with the frames, indicating that both the panels have been painted while they were already in their current frames. 99
The condition of the support of the wing panels is problematic. Both the left and the right board are deformed in a most unusual way: the lower interior wings are extremely concave, while the upper parts are more convex; this effect is especially pronounced on the right wing. A possible cause could be environmental or climax flux, with extreme variations in temperature and humidity. In 1901, it was reported that the triptych had hung too close to a sitting-room stove, and that it was badly damaged. Moreover, blistering on the lower interior scenes and flaking on the exterior 100
lower scenes had occurred, although it was not clarified if this had happened because of the extreme heat. If this was the case, it seems odd that the lower half of the centre panel did not, and does 101
not, display the same blistered surface. Another explanation for the deformation of the wing panel’s boards could be the horizontal struts that were added to the centre of the exterior wings, as they might have caused the wood not to be able to move within the frame. Yet another factor might be 102
the large proportions of the planks and their extreme thinness. Disparities between the condition of the wings and the centre panel cannot be fully explained by the presence of a cradle on the latter, and might be the result of multiple interventions or relocations.
Unnamed conservator, ‘Technisch verslag en toestand beschrijving’, 2007-2008, 2 (files of the Groeningemuseum).
97
Report of Peter Klein, Zentrum Holzwirtschaft, Universität Hamburg, 14 April 2008 (files of the Groeningemuseum,
98
Bruges).
Hilde Weissenborn and Brian Richardson, ‘Dossier van de conservatiebehandeling’, 2010, 6 (files of the
99
Groeningemuseum). Weale 1908, 103.
100
Verheyden-Van Overstraten 1977, 39; Jones 1998, 41 n193.
101
Hilde Weissenborn and Brian Richardson, ‘Dossier van de conservatiebehandeling’, 2010, 14 (files of the
102
Frames
The frames of the centre panel and the wings are remarkably different. The centre panel’s frame has a thickness of circa 11.5 cm, and a rather complex composition; an anonymous conservator
proposed in 2007-2008 that the innermost section (measuring 1 cm in width) and the outermost section (measuring 3 cm in width) are non-original additions, added to the older, presumably original, 7.5 cm-wide oak middle part of the frame in the twentieth century, and carved from lime wood. The innermost section has a white ground layer below a dark red bole that exhibits 103
artificial aging (also visible on the outermost section of the frame). The frames of the wings, 104
however, have a less complicated structure. Just like the wing’s support, the frames are made out of oak; dendrochronological analysis of the frames has yet to determine its origin and date. Both frames have a thickness of 3.2 to 3.3 cm; the width of the struts differs in several places, ranging from 6.8 to 8 cm. In contrast to the interior wings, both of the exterior faces have a horizontal 105
wooden strut fixed just above the centre-point of the panel, which serves to divide the paint surface into two sections (on the interior wings, a similar division at approximately the same height
between the scenes is instead indicated by a painted line). It is unusual to have an extra strut added to only one side of each wing, but it shows that the frame’s construction and imagery must have been very carefully conceived.
The frame of the centre panel, of which the inside is hollow in several places, might give 106
the impression of having a mortise and tenon joint, but this is not the case: the sawn struts have 107
been glued together in the front and connected at the sides, sometimes by a rather unusual dovetail (Fig. 9-10). Because of the newer additions to the frame, the moulding is rather unusual. The 108
original part of the frame consists of two sections, one of 2.5 cm wide, the other 5.2 cm wide, carved with an ogee moulding. The frames of the wing panels, on the other hand, display a different construction: the frame’s vertical and horizontal sections are joined using mortise and tenon joints, each with two dowel holes for added strength and support. The arched members seem to have been constructed with an end-to-end joint. The ogee mouldings display a ‘mixed cut’ back and front (Fig.
Unnamed conservator, ‘Technisch verslag en toestand beschrijving’, 2007-2008, 9 (files of the Groeningemuseum).
103
Unnamed conservator, ‘Technisch verslag en toestand beschrijving’, 2007-2008, 10 (files of the Groeningemuseum).
104
Hilde Weissenborn and Brian Richardson, ‘Dossier van de conservatiebehandeling’, 2010, 11 (files of the
105
Groeningemuseum).
Unnamed conservator, ‘Technisch verslag en toestand beschrijving’, 2007-2008, 11 (files of the Groeningemuseum).
106
For more information on the different joints and mouldings of frames, see Verougstraete 2015.
107
Ibid.
11). Presumably added at a later date for support, a very thin section of timber lathe of circa 3 109
mm runs along the bottom edge of both frames; below the left stile of the right wing, a piece of this plug has broken off.
With the exception of two recent holes, there are no traces of older constructions on the frame of the centre panel, which can be explained by the fact that new sections were added to the frame, and that the support was cradled. This in contrast to the frames of the wing panels. On the outer stiles of the exterior frames, four large palimpsests of early, if not original, hinges are visible, while the frame’s outer edges display the notches of the current hinges (Fig. 12-13). The outer 110
edges of the stiles of both wings show traces of several other hinges and joints, attesting to a long and varied history. This not only indicates that there were different hinges used on the Wijts Triptych in the previous centuries, but most likely also shows that the wings were originally attached to another painting before they were added to the Wijts’ centre panel. A pair of hinges visible on both of the wing panels’ frames is especially interesting, as their damage shows that their turning point lay at the side of the wings’ grisailles imagery. This, however, does not necessarily indicate that 111
the grisailles at one point would have formed the interior faces of an artwork, as it is plausible that the wings were made with spatial negotiations in mind, in which case it was common to attach hinges between the exterior side of the frames and an architectonic element. It is clear that the 112
frames of the Wijts Triptych's wing panels show clear evidence of relocation and re-use, which may help to explain the disparity of condition between each side of the wings, and may shed light on the history, as will be explored further in Chapter 6.
Paint surface
The centre panel was primed using a lead-based pigment layer, presumably a mixture of chalk 113
and animal glue like the one present on the wing panels. This preparation layer can be detected 114
on both the centre and the wing panels in places where the paint surface has developed lacunae, under very thin paint layers, and along the barbe of the wing panels. It is also likely that on the wing
A mixed cut combines a straight part and a mitre part;
109
The current hinges were disassembled when I examined the triptych in the Groeningemuseum’s depot.
110
‘Onderzoeksvoorstel Triptiek van Pieter Wyts’, 2007-2008, 8 (files of the Groeningemuseum).
111
For an example of such a construction, see Verougstraete 2015, 104, fig. J.
112
Deneckere e.a. 2010, 1502; concluded from the results of the recorded XRF spectra, and confirmed by X-ray
113
radiography, as it showed the whitish aspect on the film.
Verheyden-van Overstraeten 1977, 54; Hilde Weissenborn and Brian Richardson, ‘Dossier van de
114
