Madonna at the Fountain
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The ''Madonna at the Fountain'' is a 1439
oil on panel A panel painting is a painting made on a flat panel of wood, either a single piece or a number of pieces joined together. Until canvas became the more popular support medium in the 16th century, panel painting was the normal method, when not paint ...
painting by the
early Netherlandish Early Netherlandish painting, traditionally known as the Flemish Primitives, refers to the work of artists active in the Burgundian and Habsburg Netherlands during the 15th- and 16th-century Northern Renaissance period. It flourished especiall ...
artist
Jan van Eyck Jan van Eyck ( , ; – July 9, 1441) was a painter active in Bruges who was one of the early innovators of what became known as Early Netherlandish painting, and one of the most significant representatives of Early Northern Renaissance art. Ac ...
. It belongs to van Eyck's late work, and is his last signed and dated painting. It retains its original frame, which bears the inscription; "ALS IXH CAN", "JOHES DE EYCK ME FECIT + OMLEVIT ANNO 1439 At 19 x 12 cm. the painting is only a little larger than a postcard. It is set in a ''
hortus conclusus ''Hortus conclusus'' is a Latin term, meaning literally "enclosed garden". At their root, both of the words in ''hortus conclusus'' refer linguistically to enclosure. It describes a genre of garden that was enclosed as a practical concern, a majo ...
'', with the fountain representing the
fountain of life The Fountain of Life, or in its earlier form the Fountain of Living Waters, is a Christian iconography symbol associated with baptism and/or eucharist, first appearing in the 5th century in illuminated manuscripts and later in other art forms such ...
.Snyder 99 The
Madonna Madonna Louise Ciccone (; ; born August 16, 1958) is an American singer-songwriter and actress. Widely dubbed the " Queen of Pop", Madonna has been noted for her continual reinvention and versatility in music production, songwriting, a ...
is depicted dressed in blue, her figure framed by a richly embroidered cloth of honor supported by two angels. The Christ Child holds prayer beads in his left hand, suggesting, along with the rose bush behind the figures, the
rosary The Rosary (; la, , in the sense of "crown of roses" or "garland of roses"), also known as the Dominican Rosary, or simply the Rosary, refers to a set of prayers used primarily in the Catholic Church, and to the physical string of knots or b ...
. In the mid to late 15th century the rosary was becoming increasingly popular in northern Europe. This depiction is unusual in that the Madonna wears a blue robe; in the ''
Dresden Triptych The ''Dresden Triptych'' (or ''Virgin and Child with St. Michael and St. Catherine and a Donor'', or ''Triptych of the Virgin and Child'') is a very small hinged-triptych altarpiece by the Early Netherlandish painting, Early Netherlandish pain ...
'', ''
Lucca Madonna The ''Lucca Madonna'' is an oil painting by the Early Netherlandish master Jan van Eyck, painted in approximately 1437. It shows Mary seated on a wooden throne and crowned by a canopy, breastfeeding the infant Christ. Its carpentry suggests it w ...
'', and the ''
Madonna of Chancellor Rolin The ''Madonna of Chancellor Rolin'' is an oil painting by the Early Netherlandish master Jan van Eyck, dating from around 1435. It is kept in the Musée du Louvre, Paris, and was commissioned by Nicolas Rolin, aged 60, chancellor of the Duchy o ...
'', van Eyck had depicted her dressed in red. The use of red for the clothes of sacred figures was characteristic of 15th century Netherlandish painting, as
cochineal The cochineal ( , ; ''Dactylopius coccus'') is a scale insect in the suborder Sternorrhyncha, from which the natural dye carmine is derived. A primarily sessility (motility), sessile parasitism, parasite native to tropical and subtropical Sout ...
was among the most expensive pigments available for dying textiles. In contrast to this, Italian painters used
ultramarine Ultramarine is a deep blue color pigment which was originally made by grinding lapis lazuli into a powder. The name comes from the Latin ''ultramarinus'', literally 'beyond the sea', because the pigment was imported into Europe from mines in Afgh ...
for the robes of Madonnas. Thus van Eyck's choice of blue can be seen as evidence of Italian influence.


Byzantine influence

With the ''
Madonna in the Church ''Madonna in the Church'' (or ''The Virgin in the Church'') is a small oil panel by the early Netherlandish painter Jan van Eyck. Probably executed between c. 1438–1440, it depicts the Virgin Mary holding the Child Jesus in a Gothic cathedra ...
'' in
Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
, this is generally thought to have been one of van Eyck's two paintings of the Madonna and Child from the final years before his death in about 1441. Both show a standing Virgin, in contrast to his earlier treatments of the subject, and the great majority of other painted Virgins. Models for standing Virgins existed in the icons of
Byzantine art Byzantine art comprises the body of Christian Greek artistic products of the Eastern Roman Empire, as well as the nations and states that inherited culturally from the empire. Though the empire itself emerged from the decline of Rome and lasted ...
, and both paintings also represent modified version of the ''eleusa'' type, sometimes called the ''Virgin of Tenderness'' in English, where the Virgin and Child touch cheeks, and he reaches out a hand. The ''
Madonna in the Church ''Madonna in the Church'' (or ''The Virgin in the Church'') is a small oil panel by the early Netherlandish painter Jan van Eyck. Probably executed between c. 1438–1440, it depicts the Virgin Mary holding the Child Jesus in a Gothic cathedra ...
'' wears a blue cloak over a red dress. During the early 14th and 15th century a large number of these works were imported into the North, and were widely copied by the first generation of Netherlandish artists, among others. The iconography of both the late Byzantine, typified by the unknown artist responsible for the ''
Cambrai Madonna The ''Cambrai Madonna'', also called the ''Notre-Dame de Grâce'', produced around 1340, is a small Italo-Byzantine, possibly Sienese,Upton (1989), 52 replica of an Eleusa (''Virgin of Tenderness'') icon. The work on which it is based is bel ...
'', and 14th century successors such as
Giotto Giotto di Bondone (; – January 8, 1337), known mononymously as Giotto ( , ) and Latinised as Giottus, was an Italian painter and architect from Florence during the Late Middle Ages. He worked during the Gothic/Proto-Renaissance period. Giot ...
favoured showing the Madonna in a monumental scale, and it is accepted by art historians that van Eyck absorbed these influences, though when and through which works is disputed. It is believed that he had direct exposure to them during his visit to Italy, which occurred either in 1426 or 1428. Van Eyck's two panels carried forward the habit of reproduction and were themselves frequently copied by commercial workshops throughout the 15th century. It is possible that the Byzantine flavour to these images was also connected with contemporary attempts through diplomacy to achieve reconciliation with the
Greek Orthodox Church The term Greek Orthodox Church (Greek: Ἑλληνορθόδοξη Ἐκκλησία, ''Ellinorthódoxi Ekklisía'', ) has two meanings. The broader meaning designates "the entire body of Orthodox (Chalcedonian) Christianity, sometimes also call ...
, in which van Eyck's patron Philip the Good took a keen interest. Van Eyck's ''
Portrait of Cardinal Niccolò Albergati The ''Portrait of Cardinal Niccolò Albergati'' is a painting by early Netherlandish painter Jan van Eyck, dating to around 1431 and now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum of Vienna, Austria. Niccolò Albergati was a diplomat working under Pope Mar ...
'' (c. 1431) had depicted one of the diplomats most involved with these efforts, acting for the Papacy.


Copies

The image was much copied, with a very high-quality copy assigned to van Eyck's workshop just after the original (Private collection,
Maastricht Maastricht ( , , ; li, Mestreech ; french: Maestricht ; es, Mastrique ) is a city and a municipality in the southeastern Netherlands. It is the capital and largest city of the province of Limburg. Maastricht is located on both sides of the ...
). There is a workshop drawing of the central figures by
Gerard David Gerard David (c. 1460 – 13 August 1523) was an Early Netherlandish painter and manuscript illuminator known for his brilliant use of color. Only a bare outline of his life survives, although some facts are known. He may have been the Meester ...
of about 1500–1510 in the
Kupferstichkabinett Berlin The Kupferstichkabinett, or Museum of Prints and Drawings, is a prints museum in Berlin, Germany. It is part of the Berlin State Museums, and is located in the Kulturforum on Potsdamer Platz. It is the largest museum of graphic art in Germany, ...
, presumably used for his version of the figures, now with four angels and a panoramic landscape background of
Bruges Bruges ( , nl, Brugge ) is the capital and largest City status in Belgium, city of the Provinces of Belgium, province of West Flanders in the Flemish Region of Belgium, in the northwest of the country, and the sixth-largest city of the countr ...
, now in the
Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...
, New York. This was planned as a precise copy, but the new elements were added while the work was in progress, as modern scientific analysis of the underdrawing shows.Evans, nos. 354 and 355


Citations


References

* Margarete Bruns (1997). ''Das Rätsel Farbe – Materie und Mythos.'' Philipp Reclam jun. GmbH. * Evans, Helen C. (ed.)
''Byzantium, Faith and Power (1261-1557)''
2004, Metropolitan Museum of Art/Yale University Press, * Harbison, Craig, ''Jan van Eyck, The Play of Realism'', Reaktion Books, London, 1991, * Otto Pächt (1989). ''Van Eyck – die Begründer der altniederländischen Malerei.'' Prestel Verlag. * James Snyder (2005). ''Northern Renaissance Art: Painting, Sculpture, the Graphic Arts from 1350 to 1575.'' 2nd ed. Prentice Hall. * János Végh (1984). ''Jan van Eyck.'' Henschelverlag Kunst und Gesellschaft. * Jolly, Penny. "Jan van Eyck's Italian Pilgrimage: A Miraculous Florentine Annunciation and the Ghent Altarpiece". ''Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte. 61. Bd., H. 3, 1998


External links

*
Madonna at the Fountain
' on the website of the Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten {{ACArt Paintings by Jan van Eyck 1439 paintings Paintings in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp Paintings of the Madonna and Child Angels in art