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

CHAPTER X 206 13. Coremans 1953, 12. 14. Verougstraete-Marcq and Van Schoute 1989, 275-284. The hinges were different in the lower and the upper altarpiece. Usually in altarpieces, the node of a hinge (the rotating axis) is placed on the inside where the wing falls against the central portion, with the blade on the side of the frame. Between two wings, this node was on the outside. This made the wings easy to open, and stiff when closing, as already mentioned. In the altarpieces by the Van Eyck brothers, the blades of the hinges are placed on the fronts of the frames, and not on the sides, as would generally be the case later. This arrangement of the blades does not change the characteristics of flexibility or rigidity of rotation which depends mainly on the position of the node. Today there remain just four original outside hinge blades (for the junction between two wings), two on the frame of Adam and two on that of Eve. These blades are rectangular, embedded (wedged into a slot) in the outer surface of the frame, and nailed by means of four vertically aligned forged nails. These blades were originally extended with either one or two knuckles, which have today been sawn off. Into the knuckles was fixed a free pin to hold the node together and enable the wings to hang. This pin was removed to disunite the knuckles and detach the wings. Presumably all that remained of the ironwork on the wings in the 19th century was removed in Berlin. Only Adam and Eve, who were kept in Belgium, retained their hinge leafs. Inside the altarpieces, the hinges between the central part and the wing were larger than the hinges between the wings. They may have had elongated and perhaps even decorative straps. In 1950, many holes and other damage were noted in the stiles of the frames next to the central part. 13 These could be the consequence of the removal of the hinges and the nails fixing the blades (or straps), while their number could be explained by possible reinforcements following problems related to the weight of the wings. Not only the hinges, but also the metal hooks and other closing systems (locks, latches etc.) have for the most part been removed or their traces camouflaged in the 19th and 20th centuries. The rebate that closed the upper altarpiece is now filled with wooden slats. Is such a removal or hiding of functional elements, which complicates the interpretation of primitive articulation, necessary? The question deserves being discussed in broader context. The difference in conception from one altarpiece to another is marked. The two altarpieces have frames that cannot have been designed by the same wood craftsmen. 14 The lower altarpiece is a more everyday piece of joinery. The upper altarpiece by contrast suggests that a carpenter also has been brought in. We know that the carpenters and joiners argued over which jobs should be done by their respective trades. On 5 July 1455, a concordat between the joiners and carpenters of Bruges delimited the field of activity of each other. Joiners were permitted to produce