File:History of mediæval art (1893) (14594043658).jpg

Identifier: historyofmedival00rebe (find matches)
Title: History of mediæval art
Year: 1893 (1890s)
Authors: Reber, Franz von, 1834-1919 Clarke, Joseph Thacher, d. 1920
Subjects: Art, Medieval
Publisher: New York : Harper & Bros.
Contributing Library: Boston Public Library
Digitizing Sponsor: Boston Public Library

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eces rather than of devotional pictures. Jans Head ofChrist, referable to the year 1438, now in the Museum of Berlin, isin sentiment vastly inferior to the types portrayed by Hubert in thealtar of Ghent. The more perfect, on the other hand, are Jans por-traits, particularly when somewhat genre-like in conception. Thefinest of all the works of this kind, dating from the fifteenth century,and one of the greatest masterpieces of all ages, is the portrait ofGiovanni Arnolfini of Lucca, and his wife Jeanne de Chenany, paint-ed in 1434, now in the National Gallery of London. The life-like 704 PAINTING OF THE GOTHIC EPOCH. character of these unattractive personages, portrayed with a morethan photographic truth to nature, is not even the chief merit ofthe work: finer still is the representation of the interior and all theaccessaries, which, in delicacy and clearness, has not been surpassedbefore or since, and in fine effects of light and color was unequalleduntil the time of Pieter de Hooghe.
Text Appearing After Image:
Fig. 422.—Madonna of Canon van der Paele, by Jan van Eyck. Academy of Bruges. It is not strange that in the fifteenth century opinion was unde-cided in regard to the relative greatness of the two brothers, andthat the preference was often given to Jan, who, owing to his longerlife, accomplished more, and was able to establish a school. Still,among those supposed to have been his pupils, only one is wellknown, Petrus Cristus of Bruges, who, like Jan van Eyck, usuallysigned his pictures. His best works are his portraits; these, how-ever, are not equal to those of Jan. Chief among them is that dated THE NETHERLANDS. 705 1449, in the Oppenheim Collection at Cologne, representing a bridalcouple who are buying their wedding-rings of the goldsmith St. Eli-gius. This is a peculiar mixture of portraiture and of genre-like re-ligious art, which, from the elaboration of the accessaries,—as, forinstance, the jewellery exposed for sale,—has in great measure thecharacter of a still-life. If t

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