Frames and supports in 15th and 16th-century Southern Netherlandish painting

DEVELOPMENT OF THE CONSTRUCTION OF FRAMES 133 frame applied to the outside of the Walcourt wings (Namur, PMAA , no. 1 ). It is also applied in the Virgin at the Fountain (Antwerp, RMFA , no. 3 ) and the Portrait of a Man (Self Portrait?) by Jan van Eyck (London, The National Gallery, inv. no. NG222) to adjust the mouldings of the frame which are cut partially into the same board as the panel and partially applied. In none of the three cases is the frame a separate joinery item. In the case of a mortise and tenon joint, mitring requires the shoulder of the tenon to be “advanced” at least to the depth of the moulding. After that the rest of the shoulder is either cut square or (a later development) continued as a full mitre. Initially, as with the frame of the Virgin and Child with Canon Joris van der Paele (Bruges, GM , no. 1 ), the mitre is only as deep as the moulding and the rest of the joint, with the mortise and tenon, is cut square. Here, and in other early frames, the mitre is cut right across both the mortise and the tenon, reducing both the length and the width of the tenon accordingly. This negatively affects the strength of the joint by reducing the contact (and gluing and pegging) surface inside the mortise. Very quickly, except where the frame is moulded on two sides, the solution of the double-sided advance was abandoned and the back of the mortise restored to its full width, with no advance of the tenon shoulder to the rear (referred to below also as “floating”). · The mortise and tenon joint, mixed cut on one face, cut square on the other (fig. 19: 4; fig. 21 ) We found this type of joint in 13 cases: Ghent, MFA , no. 1 (Ghent Anonymous, Wenemaer Altarpiece ); Ghent, CM , no. 1 (Ghent Anonymous, Crucifixion ); Tournai, MFA , no 1 (Anonymous, Genealogy of St Francis ); Tongeren, MC , no. 1 (follower of Rogier van der Weyden, Virgin and Child with Donor ); PC , no. 1 (follower of Rogier van der Weyden, Virgin and Child ); Bruges, SJH , no. 6 (Anonymous, Triptych of the Crucifixion ); Ghent, MFA , no. 2 (Master of the Lineage of St Anne, Triptych of the Lineage of St Anne ); Bruges, GM , no. 7 (follower of Hans Memling, Virgin and Child ); Bruges, SJH , no. 10 (Anonymous, Man of Sorrows ); Bruges, GM , no. 12 (Anonymous, two wings with Scenes from the Legend of St George ); Tournai, MFA , no. 3 (Jan van Eeckele (?), Lactation of St Bernard ); Bruges, GM , no. 20 (Pieter Claeissens the Elder, two wings with St Anthony and Abbot Wydoot ); Bruges, OLPM , no. 5 (Anonymous, Triptych of the Holy Women at the Tomb ).