Jan van Eyck was a very popular artist in Flanders.
No-one knows if this is a self-portrait by one of the greatest painter of all time, but it makes for interesting speculation. It could have been a commission.
There is an intensity to the gaze. The features are beautifully captured. And that incredible red chaperon, the fashion headwear of men in the 15th century, is Jan van Eyck showing off his skill.
I’m a huge fan of Pieter de Hooch’s genre paintings.
In this blog post, I wanted to share 2 outstanding paintings at London’s NG.
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I love this painting. I always make a beeline to see it in room 16.
It has an intensity (an assiduousness) that is captivating as well as charming.
It’s in my favourite 10 paintings of the National Gallery.
Pieter de Hooch was a master painter of the Dutch Golden Age. He moved to Amsterdam in 1660 and art history explains a shift from his earlier Delft art - genre paintings focused on the ordinary people in their homes and courtyards.
The little girl is the centre of the painting, and the source of the painting’s warmth and charm. A statement about a well-ordered & healthy home? Perhaps. But interesting that he paints the other lady with her back to us.
De Hooch’s power in the use of light is not only masterful (e.g. soft shadows in the archway for depth) but powerful in its interaction with luminous flowers and foliage. To me, it seems to recreate that afternoon sunny effect in which flowers & plants appear to glow with a beautiful intensity.
As for the brickworks, my goodness. To me, it seems he treats the brickworks like nature itself. He treats it as a subject worthy of delicacy and meticulousness. I discovered on wikipedia that his father, Hendrick Hendricksz de Hooch, was a bricklayer. So that explains that. De Hooch paints every single brick with mortar between them and expertly weaves them together to stunning open-mouthed effect.
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A bit of mystery here.
There is a sense of unease or tension in the relationship between the woman and her maid.
The maid seems to be cooking some food. Perhaps a stew, a cooking pot in front of her (black) on a little fire of sorts. Next to a waterpump to cook with? Broom to sweep (same broom as the The Courtyard of a House above).
The woman in the courtyard looks like the woman of the house. Seemingly wealthy (finer clothing), she seems to be looking at the maid closely with hands outstretched (as if to say “well?”). It’s a bit of an unease - like she’s keeping an eye on her. It could be a snapshot of daily life. Though, the girl/maid on floor seems to have a frown and eyes are looking downwards. It’s interesting that De Hooch doesn’t show us the woman’s face - perhaps to depersonalise her? Make us aware of her function in the everyday daily life - but no more? Because we empathise with the maid. But, who knows if this is supposed to have moral overtones?
The bricks - warm reddish coloured walls are beautiful against the yellow-ey floor. A detailed analysis of how light and shadow play across the brickworks. Here they’re slightly uneven and slightly worn. Fascinating golden cloth/tapestry - it could be a visual enhancement (adding a contrasting colour) or simply a visual detail familiar to the original patrons.
Outstanding.
Some weeks ago, I finally visited the much anticipated debut of the Sainsbury Wing of London’s National Gallery.
I found it exhilarating.
I walked from room to room bursting with excitement about what I was going to find on the walls.
The corridors and rooms are fabulously curated with easily-discernible themes and ideas. The architecture and design lend a stately aesthetic to the museum’s prized works.
I must admit I was a little overwhelmed at one point – how lucky to live close to such beauty & treasures which are free to the public. I always tell people that if they’re feeling down or depressed, the National Gallery is a beautiful refuge to forget the outside world.
Rating: 5/5 ★★★★★
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Fabulous portrait.
This masterpiece from the National Gallery in London features a picture which opens my new book.
Constantijn Huygens was a polymath. Secretary to two princes of Orange, diplomat, poet, musician, aficionado of painting, and owned a huge library and engaged in animated written correspondence with great intellectuals, including Descartes and contemporary painters - Pieter Lastman, Jan Lievens, Gerard Gerrit van Honthorst, Anthony van Dyck, Rembrandt etc. A giant during the Dutch Golden Age.
Finally London National Gallery’s major rehang is being unveiled May 10.
It’s being celebrated as CC Land: The Wonder of Art.
Jackie Wullschläger writing, in “The National Gallery’s rehang is a fine achievement — proof that it is a sanctuary of beauty” (FT) has shared some big changes (most especially the 1000 works on display and the Jan van Eyck self-portrait):
More paintings are on show (more than 1,000), and all look better, thanks to muted wall colours throughout, allowing the canvases’ chromatic richness to shine. The hang plays to the building’s strength, those numerous corridor-like galleries which entice you on, promising revelations, broad vistas, intriguing associations.
‘Algernon Moses Marsden’ by Jacques Joseph
Tissot (1887) © The National GalleryAt other times, fresh arrivals shift a room’s whole tenor ... Interloper among Renoir, Pissarro and Sisley, Tissot’s assertive businessman “Algernon Moses Marsden”, elbow resting on a flamboyant tiger’s rug, reminds us how diverse the 19th-century avant garde was. Marsden looks unreliable and was — he went bankrupt three times. Delightfully, his great-grandson, fund manager Martyn Arbib, made this recent purchase possible.
Spurring the entire overhaul was the Sainsbury Wing closure in 2023, for its foyer to be redeveloped. Architect Annabelle Selldorf will vanquish what Finaldi called the “forest” of obtrusive pillars, to provide a better, brighter main entrance, not yet unveiled. It will deliver, Finaldi promises, “a warm welcome” and speed: “from the tube to Titian in a minute and a half.”
An artist’s impression of the reconfigured Sainsbury
Wing of the National Gallery © The National GalleryCompared with current queues and security checks, that sounds heartening: straight upstairs to room nine, the splendid Venetian gallery, now opening on a room for the first time dedicated solely to Titian — destination pictures “Bacchus and Ariadne”, “Diana and Actaeon”, “The Death of Actaeon”, pagan myths of seduction, cruelty, fate, brought alive in the richest, fleshiest painting, foundational to art history.
Piero della Francesca’s pellucid, calmly geometric “Baptism of Christ” is back in its chapel-like setting. Jacopo di Cione’s “Coronation of the Virgin” with its orchestra of angels returns within a new carved frame, every finial and column painstakingly gilded, uniting its two parts. In an inlaid wood frame with wave decorations, Uccello’s gleaming, restored “The Battle of San Romano” — snow-white chargers, crimson/gold hat, grid pattern of broken lances — looks almost modern; “like de Chirico”, Finaldi says.
Northern Renaissance pictures large and small, amply though not sparsely hung, have also settled into this faux nave setting. Watching over them is Van Eyck’s quizzical “Portrait of a Man”, another restoration success: overpainted black ground removed, narrow sloping shoulders clearer, contrasts of light and shadow thrown by the extravagant creased turban more vivid.
Some very joyous new displays loftily transcend culture wars, celebrating individual (male) genius — all the Monets, from the realistic choppy seascape “La Pointe de la Hève” to the abstracting “Water-Lilies”, gather for the first time in one room, demonstrating continuity as well as sustained experiment — and personal taste.
A theatrical gallery partly reprises Charles I’s rare collection, reuniting famous pictures of turbulent post-execution provenance: Tintoretto’s vigorous, intense narrative “Esther before Ahasuerus”, from the Royal Collection; Correggio’s soft, blue-gold-white harmony of figures in a landscape “The School of Love”. Charles’s reign, Finaldi says, “was a key moment when the English court was at its most refined and engaged with Europe — and he lost his head!”
Pivotal to Finaldi’s vision are particular relationships between artists, taking Turner’s demand that his seaports hang alongside Claude’s as “nodal points, steering elements”. Rembrandt’s “Self-portrait at the Age of 34” hangs with its model, Titian’s “Portrait of Gerolamo Barbarigo”; Dutch Caravaggesque follower Gerard van Honthorst is next to the master.
Back in January, I went to a small exhibition at the National Gallery celebrating John Constable’s iconic The Hay Wain.
Constable and The Hay Wain was a wonderful exploration of this beloved painting, its influences and its legacy. The shortcoming in the exhibition, I felt, was gallery’s maladroit handling of Constable’s non-political art against the purported exegenices of activism in his day. But, this can probably be written-off as a bit of the usual wokeism.
Overall score: ★★★★ 4/5
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According to the gallery, it sat in a french collection until 1886. It seems that when Constable first exhibited the painting in England, at the Royal Academy of Arts, in 1821, it did not sell.
The painting was received to great acclaim in the 1824 Paris Salon though, with a gold medal from the king of France, Charles X.
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| 1910-20 photo of the house featured in The Hay Wain. |
Originally, the house in the painting was the property of a tenant farmer called William Lott. He lived there during Constable’s lifetime. Apparently, he rarely ventured outside his home.
But, by 1925 it had fallen into disrepair. A local MP (Thomas Parkington) then bought the estate and restored the building (as Constable depicted it).
The serene & “prelapsarian” calmness of The Hay Wain has made this picture an enduring cushion to the hurly-burly of modernity. An antidote. A refuge to happier times.
Yet, despite this, I still found myself surprised at just how easily this panorama has become the object of those who wish to agitate and shock us from our supposed apathy, such as:
The Hay Wain has been used by Peter Kennard for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (Haywain with Cruise Missiles). In 2022, Quentin Devine recreated this image to warn about the dangers of the climate change.
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Next the exhibition turns to the subject of land as an “issue of politics”. I.e. - who owned land, the right of common access, restrictions on foreign grain imports (“Corn Laws”) following the Napoleonic Wars resulted in food prices rocketing.
Ms Christine Riding, curator of the exhibition, takes the view that landscape is political. As such, pictures of agriculture and harvest take on a “new significance” in the context of the era. Some artists wanted to create a picturesque image (inspired by the Dutch & Flemish) and some sought to closely reflect the natural world.
For me, I am not sure I accept the premise that the landscape is necessarily political. It may be; or it may not be. I think it is a bit harsh to judge Constable against these standards. Constable represented a departure from previous landscape paintings. They were very classical and stylised methods which did not necessarily reflect life. Constable only worked from life and made very intense and detailed sketches. His inclusion of peasants and farmers was also revolutionary. His work (alongside JMW Turner) inspired the future French Impressionists and he was highly regarded in France.
Why should Constable have expressly included the social ills suffered by lower classes in Britain? He wasn’t trying to be the rural equivalent of Hogarth. He wanted to paint something beautiful, that he loved.
These wonderful paintings were from the National Gallery.
Botticelli was one of the greatest painters of Renaissance. He produced beautiful paintings.
Filippino Lippi was the son of Fra Filippo Lippi and the student of Botticelli. He bridges the divide between the Early and High Renaissance.
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Masterpiece.
Venus is the God of love (free-flowing translucent white robes, elegant & graceful, delicate, timeless beauty); Mars is the God of war (strong, muscular).
Amazing contrast between his strength (muscular pose) and the naked and carefree way he’s resting with Venus.
Satyrs with allegorical meaning - they’re holding Mars’ jousting lance and helmet playfully, playing musical pipes into the ears of Mars ... and he seems totally overcome.
It’s interesting that Mars seems to be leaning onto the only armoured satyr. Indicating, again, that love has taken precedence.
Love conquers war?
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Relegated to the margins of art history, it was only until the beginning of the 20th century that he was properly recognised.
Aged 16, he was apprenticed to Fra Filippo Lippi, one of the leading Florentine painters at that time (and favored by the influential Medici family). This would prove to be critical as Botticelli spent most of his life working for the Medici family. When Botticelli was his pupil, Lippi was famous for his “Madonna and Child with Two Angels”. It proved v. popular because of its uncommonly elegant depiction of the Virgin Mary. It’s easy to see its influence on him - but he later advanced into more complicated compositions, e.g. the Adoration of the Magi.
These put him on the map and he was invited by the Pope (aged 36) to paint some frescoes on the walls of the Sistine Chapel - increasing his fame and reputation. Returning to Florence, Botticelli received even more valuable commissions from the Medici family and other wealthy Florentines (e.g., “La Primavera” and three years later “The Birth of Venus”).
A few years after “The Birth of Venus”, Savonarola became very influential in Florence. This maniac was the cause of secular being destroyed. He complained “You have made the Virgin appear dressed as a whore.” Many Florentines - including Botticelli - embraced his ideas. He cut down the secular, mythological works, and the elegant and gracious depictions of the Virgin Mary.
Botticelli ended up abandoning his work. As an old man, he found himself so poor that if Lorenzo de’ Medici and then his friends had not come to his assistance, he would have died of hunger.
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Unknown sitter. Amazing hair locks. Beautiful beretta.
Sandro Botticelli was one of the first Italian artists to abandon the profile format for portraits in favour of a frontal view.
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Very beautiful.
Calm and devotional.
Leaning slightly forward, head lowered, arms crossed with crucifix in between. Seems to be standing on the rocky ground - with no shoes. Ref. to his humility.
Angels surrounding St Francis. Their wings are gilded symbolising their heavenly nature.
Peaceful and playing hymns, they’re joining him in his moment of mediation.
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Love this one.
Beautifully metaphorical.
The only painting Botticelli signed. It bears several half-legible inscriptions, explaining its creation in 1500 in the aftermath of “the troubles of Italy” - i.e. Savonarola’s religious fundamentalism.
The traditional nativity scene - the Virgin Mary kneels to adore the Christ baby raising his arm to his mother.
People joyfully embracing.
There are interesting themes which seem irregular and portentous:
The painting itself is rife with subtle premonitions: The sheet infant Jesus rests on evokes the shroud he would be wrapped in after his crucifixion, the mark of the cross is depicted on the hump of the donkey’s back, and the wooden hut he was born in sits in front of a cave where he would eventually be laid to rest in before his resurrection. Also noteworthy is Botticelli’s decision to include three angels embracing mortal men in the foreground — a motif usually relegated to renditions of the Last Judgment in accordance with the Second Coming of Christ.
Another unusual aspect is that the three kings welcome Jesus empty-handed, rather than with gold, frankincense, and myrrh — perhaps influenced by Savonarola’s sermon, though it could be argued that the ultimate gifts are their prayers and devotion. Throughout the lower half of the painting, seven miniature devils flee into the fissures and crevices in their return to the underworld, with some impaling themselves on their own spears.
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Busy & devotional.
Painted when Filippino was in Botticelli’s studio.
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Interesting. More expressive in colours than Botticelli?
Love the chaos and disorder. There’s a soldier sitting, in the corner, with a bored weary posture.
The shinning star in the middle.
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The colours are incredible. An early work by Filippino.
I love Saint John’s depiction:
Christ’s slightly older cousin, Saint John the Baptist, looks up in wonder. He wears his traditional camel-hair shirt and holds his reed cross, and clutches at the folds of his red cloak with both hands.
How does Leonardo da Vinci Paint such enigmatic smiles and faces?
The Madonna seems to be glowing with pride, tenderness and love. Saint Anne looks at her daughter with so much warmth. The Madonna’s cheeks have a wonderful smoky effect - sfumato.
Using shading to fine-tune the expressiveness of the face.
This is the only surviving large-scale drawing by Leonardo da Vinci.
The Virgin Mary sitting on the lap of her mother, Saint Anne. Mary cradles the Christ Child in her arms, who reaches towards his cousin Saint John the Baptist with a gesture of blessing.The drawing is known today as The Burlington House Cartoon, after the building in which it was displayed when it was in the collection of the Royal Academy.
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