Full title | Saint Luke painting the Virgin and Child |
---|---|
Artist | Workshop of Quinten Massys |
Artist dates | 1465/6 - 1530 |
Series | Panel from a Triptych |
Date made | about 1520? |
Medium and support | Oil on oak |
Dimensions | 114.9 × 35.4 cm |
Acquisition credit | Presented by Henry Wagner, 1924 |
Inventory number | NG3902 |
Location | Not on display |
Collection | Main Collection |
A man sits in a luxuriously furnished room, painting a picture. This is Saint Luke, patron saint of painters and physicians. Many of the objects around him refer to these professions, and his symbol, the ox, lies at his side.
The picture is full of information on how Renaissance painters worked. Saint Luke is seated at an easel; his painting, already in its frame, rests on an adjustable ledge. He is working on the Virgin’s head and his wooded palette is set out with an array of pigments. The saint supports his hand with a mahlstick with a padded grey knob on the end, which rests on the frame, and has a selection of brushes with wooden handles.
Books and containers for medicines sit on shelves at the back. Below hang two basketwork canisters, containers for urine flasks – the physician’s characteristic tool.
A man in a red cap, fur-lined robe and luxurious fur cape sits in a luxuriously furnished room, painting a picture. This is Saint Luke, patron saint of painters and physicians, who was thought to have painted a picture of the Virgin and Child and is called ‘Luke, the beloved physician’ in Saint Paul’s Epistle to the Colossians (4: 14). Many of the objects around him refer to these professions, and his symbol, the ox, lies at his side like a large dog.
The picture is full of information on how Renaissance painters worked, although they perhaps did not always work in such comfortable surroundings. Saint Luke is seated at a three-legged easel, similar in appearance to a modern easel, and his work rests on an adjustable ledge supported by movable pegs. The painting itself, which shows the Virgin and Child, is already in its frame (various paintings in our collection show evidence of having been painted in their frames). The saint is working on the Virgin’s head and his wooded palette is set for painting flesh: in its centre he has prepared a pink by mixing white, red lake and vermillion pigments. He supports his hand with a mahlstick with a padded grey knob on the end, which rests on the frame, and has a selection of brushes – some in his hands, one resting on the ledge of the easel – with wooden handles. There is more equipment on a stool next to him: a knife; a mussel shell, possibly containing shell gold; and a glazed pot, presumably containing oil or varnish, or a thinner, or something for cleaning brushes.
Behind the saint’s head is a large convex mirror, reflecting his back, the painting and the easel. The room in which he is working has an arched wooden ceiling, two windows – one is only visible in the mirror – and a tiled floor. The window on the right is glazed and there is a carved wooden bench on the back wall. Above it hang two canisters of basketwork, the protective packaging in which urine flasks – the physician’s characteristic tool – were then kept. Above these are two shelves, the lower one partially covered by a purple curtain. Several books rest on it, stacked in some disorder, fore-edges facing outwards as they would have been at this period. There are red and blue tags stuck between the pages of three of them, perhaps to mark important passages. On the top shelf are various pots and jars, doubtless pharmacist’s containers for drugs.
This painting and The Virgin standing in a Niche are the back and front of the right wing of a triptych. No other parts of this altarpiece are known to survive but the centre panel probably showed a Virgin and Child. The left wing may have depicted a patron, perhaps with his saint (see Panel from a Triptych for example).
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Saint Luke painting the Virgin and Child
Panel from a Triptych
These two paintings – Saint Luke painting the Virgin and Child and The Virgin standing in a Niche – are, in fact, the back and front of the same panel, which has been sawn through its thickness. They once formed the right wing of a triptych (a painting made in three parts). Although they have been cut on all four sides, not much has been lost and the triptych must have been tall and narrow in format. The centre panel probably showed the Virgin and Child enthroned, much as they appear in the picture Saint Luke is shown painting.
Differences in technique suggest they were by different painters, but both are close to the style of Massys and follow many of his technical procedures. They may well have been produced by two or more assistants in his workshop or by painters who trained there and continued to work together after leaving.
These two paintings – Saint Luke painting the Virgin and Child and The Virgin standing in a Niche – are, in fact, the back and front of the same panel, which has been sawn through its thickness. Both are painted on single boards of Baltic oak, cut from a tree growing between 1429 and 1508. They once formed the right wing of a triptych. Although they have been cut on all four sides, not much has been lost and the triptych must have been tall and narrow in format.
The centre panel (now missing) probably showed the Virgin and Child enthroned, much as they appear in the picture Saint Luke is painting. The Virgin must have looked rather as she does in The Virgin and Child with Saints Catherine and Barbara. The infant Christ in Saint Luke’s picture twists his body to look away from his mother, and we can assume that in the centre panel he also looked away from the Virgin and towards the triptych’s left wing (also missing). This may have shown a donor, or a donor presented by his patron saint (as in Saint Ambrose with Ambrosius van Engelen by Albrecht Bouts, for example).
Technical analysis shows that, although originally opposite sides of the same painting, the pictures were painted in slightly different ways. Both are on chalk ground, but while Saint Luke painting the Virgin and Child does not have a priming, The Virgin standing in a Niche has a grey priming which has been applied across the surface in broad roughly horizontal brushstrokes. Infrared reflectography has revealed underdrawing on both panels, but that for Saint Luke was done freehand, with straight lines incised using a ruler, while that for the Virgin appears to have been based on a cartoon. There is much diagonal hatching for Saint Luke’s headgear and draperies, whereas there is none for the Virgin.
The differences in the styles of underdrawing and some of the painting techniques suggest they were by different painters. Both, however, are close to the style of Quinten Massys and follow many of his technical procedures (such as using very thin scumbles of paint to modify colours and suggest textures, and blotting with fingers to soften tonal transitions). They may well have been produced by two or more assistants in his workshop or by painters who trained there and continued to work together after leaving.


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