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

CHAPTER II 48 11. Marijnissen 1985, 128-129. 12. Lefève 1962, 128-145; Marijnissen and Grosemans 1982-1983, 120-132. Some butt joints are reinforced with dovetail keys (fig. 13: 5). Original dovetails are rare in Netherlandish works. The support of one work by Jan II van Rillaer, Triptych of the Life of St Nicholas (Brussels, RMFAB , no. 31 ) is reinforced with several dovetail keys arranged symmetrically on the paint layer side. In Jean Bellegambe’s Virgin and Child , dovetails are placed on both the front and the reverse (fig. 16). In the panel of The Ascent to Calvary conserved in a Private Collection in Liège ( PC , no. 4 ), the join has an original dovetail on the reverse. A dovetail key on the front of a panel may serve to repair a crack (Anonymous, Virgin with Butterfly , Liège, Musée d’Art Religieux et d’Art Mosan). Fig. 16. Dovetails showing through the paint layer of Jean Bellegambe’s Virgin and Child , early 16th century (Brussels, RMFAB , no. 16 ). 2. Half-lap joint (fig. 13: 6-7) Half-lap joints occur rarely. In this type of joint, a rabbet cut into one piece alternates with a rabbet cut into the other piece. This system was adopted for certain supports of works by Colijn de Coter, Episodes from the Life of St Rumbold (Mechelen, Cathedral). Other joints, less often encountered, are also distinguished from the butt joint. These involve various kinds of slotted joints, in which one element penetrates into the other. 3. V-shaped tongue-and-groove joint (fig. 13: 8-9) The V-shaped tongue-and-groove joint (sometimes called conical joint) occurs in the first third of the 16th century, for example in the Calvary Triptych by an anonymous master (John Dutransnoit?), c. 1525-1530 (Ellezelles, Church of St Peter in Chains). 11 The V-shaped tongue-and-groove joint is also adopted to join a horizontal element into the vertical elements in works by Rubens, in the wings of the Triptych of the Erection of the Cross and those of the Triptych of the Descent from the Cross , 1612 (Antwerp, Cathedral of Our-Lady). 12