A visually exciting, focused exploration of two of the great masterpieces of early Netherlandish painting.
This book celebrates the reunion, for the first time in twenty-four years and only the second time in their history, of two masterpieces of early Netherlandish painting commissioned by the Carthusian monk Jan Vos during his tenure as prior of the Charterhouse of Bruges in the 1440s: the Frick Collection’s Virgin and Child with St. Barbara, St. Elizabeth, and Jan Vos (commissioned from Jan van Eyck and completed by his workshop) and the Gemaldegalerie’s Virgin and Child with St. Barbara and Jan Vos (painted by Petrus Christus). These works are examined with a selection of objects that place them in the rich Carthusian context for which they were created. Drawing on a recent campaign of technical examination and new archival research, this lavishly illustrated, scholarly volume explores the works’ creation, patronage, function, and reception, offering a focused look at devotional and artistic practices in Bruges during the mid-fifteenth century. This is a significant contribution to the body of published knowledge of the role played by images in shaping monastic life and funerary strategies in late medieval Europe. AUTHOR: Emma Capron is the 2016 18 Anne L. Poulet Curatorial Fellow. A doctoral candidate at the Courtauld Institute of Art, her dissertation focuses on the patronage of altarpieces in late medieval Avignon, while her broader research interest covers every aspect of Northern Renaissance art. SELLING POINTS: . Celebrates the reunion, for the first time in twenty-four years and only the second time in their history, of two masterpieces of early Netherlandish painting commisioned by the Carthusian monk Jan Vos . A significant contribution to the body of published knowledge of the role played by images in shaping monastic life and funerary strategies in late medieval Europe . A lavishly illustrated, scholarly volume 85 colour images