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

CHAPTER X 192 The first part of this chapter contains the description of the frames that was published in 1989, with some added details. The frames of the lower altarpiece adopt a model that is standard for a 15th century altarpiece. Those of the upper altarpiece have no known equivalent. Their design is the result of a serious reflection on the weight of the wings. In it we can identify an original approach to avoid the much-feared sagging by adopting a structure that evokes the work of carpenters. The woodworkers’ efforts were, however, not ultimately successful. From the late 15th century onwards the archives refer to concerns without specifying their exact object, but we can suppose that they relate to the sagging of the upper wings. This sagging has left traces that are visible till today. The second part of this chapter examines two until now unexploited or unknown elements of the pictorial layer of the upper altarpiece, the first of which relates to the duality of the altarpiece and the other to the positioning at angles of the wings with Adam and with Eve. The first element is the text on the banderols of the applied brocade ( Pressbrokat ) behind the Virgin and St John the Baptist, an area now almost everywhere severely damaged. Some historians consider that the artist inscribed there a fantasy text, though this is highly unlikely in such a solemn location. Others believe the text to have become illegible. And indeed it has been damaged and retouched almost everywhere. Even so, half of this text can be seen on a half banderol under St John’s right hand. Furthermore, on another half banderol we read . This inscription is already visible to the naked eye and even more clearly on the X-radiograph. The latter attests the original nature of the inscription: the brocade was applied to the substrate before the painting of the major figures, and the inscription was inscribed from the outset. The reading we propose of this inscription supports the idea that the upper altarpiece was painted by Jan in tribute to his late brother. This context pleads in favour of attributing to Jan the learned quatrain found on the frame. The first altarpiece, placed on the altar, that Hubert left unfinished at his death and which Jan completed, is the one that has given the title Mystic Lamb to the ensemble. Subsequently the second altarpiece was fixed to the wall above the first. Its subject is a Double Intercession . Our forefathers were strongly influenced by the representation of our ancestors and sometimes spoke of this work as the Adam and Eve painting, a name that occasionally designated the two altarpieces together. The second painted element that retains our attention here is the illusionist representation in two places (the wing with Adam and that with Eve, and the Annunciation scene on the outside) of the shadows of the frames in the painted composition. What is unique here is that it is not all the frames that cast a shadow on the painting but only the frames mentioned above. This points to a special significance that we must look for. We propose to see them as an instruction regarding the position of the wings.