Northern Renaissance: The Supreme Art

Considering the information given in the documentary  ”Northern Renaissance: The Supreme Art”, the conclusion can be drawn that artists, particularly Jan Van Eyck, were becoming much more interested in the natural world as it truly existed, rather than the more stylized art forms in existence previously. 

In an early 15^th century Europe that was torn by seemingly never ending wars, dual popes and the recent catastrophic effects of the plague, Burgundy was experiencing a period of peace and prosperity.  Fortunes were being made by merchants who had the initiative and the luck to make them. The economic model of the day appeared to be “Trickle Down”, Lavish spending by the rich would eventually reach the lower classes like wind to windmills. Much of the valuable art around Flanders were decorative pieces covered in valuable metals and jewels that would then be destroyed for their resources and created into new pieces of art to be briefly enjoyed. These Northern European noveau riche were primed for something new.

Claus Sluters “Well of Moses” was cited as an early work of this “something new”. Sluter created sculptures that appeared to be actual people rather than stylised versions. They were there complete with all the wrinkles and mannerisms that constitute what makes a person an individual. Sluter was embracing the natural world as it was truly empirically observed. This new appreciation has been called Naturalism and the “Well of Moses” was no longer a piece that was subordinate to the architecture of the monastery in Champmol that surrounded it.

Jan Van Eycks was surely influenced by this new perspective as he mastered manuscript illumination and began work on the Altarpiece at Ghent. Previously painting had been utilized more as decorative touches to works in churches, telling stories and coloring statues. Van Eycks mastery of oils and the multiple layers of paint that can capture the structure of jewels and the nature of skin immediately took hold of the imagination and placed his painting as the centerpiece of the church. A 15^th Century approach to Christianity involved the visualizing of the characters in bible stories. Deep meditative prayer was often utilized in order to place ones self mentally into the stories to experience them firsthand. This intensely naturalistic Altarpiece could enter the viewer through their eyes and place them directly into this world of God. It is incredibly moving and must have been mind staggering to anyone of the time period. It is more incredible when contemplating that painters of this period were considered to be at the same class level as mortuary workers.

This particular painter, Van Eycks, was not considered to be at this class level for long. Historical records show that Bruges Magistrates visited Van Eyckes studios in 1432 in order to see his assistants work.  His assistants... and they came to them. Painting and those who had mastered the craft, seem to have moved into a different class altogether.

Van Eycks solidified this new class by painting another Altarpiece for a charity hospital funded by a vineyard owner, Nicholas Rolan (sp?). Rolan had made his fortune with vineyards. The wine from these vineyards was used for the mass at the churches. It is interesting to note that he amassed his fortune with a product that was elemental to the service and difficult to imagine the psychological implications involved with that products magical property to transubstantiate into the blood of the the entire populations theological savior.

Naturalism had been embraced by the church and the secular world was clamoring for it as well, as demonstrated by the painting of Giovanni Arnolfini and his mysterious wife. Painting had taken steps towards being an ascendant art form by making the labor itself what made the art valuable. Northern Europeans saw the works that were being produced and raised these artists from Mortuary workers to a class all their own.