by Noah Charney
The two central panels of the upper register show the open room in which the Annunciation takes place, with a view through the windows at the back to a contemporary, but unidentified, cityscape. Two women, known as the Erythraean and Cumaean sibyls, float above the room, in the same space occupied by the prophet Zechariah. A sibyl is an Old Testament female prophet, whose words were interpreted as foreshadowing the coming of Christ. Fragments of their prophecies are inscribed in swirling painted banners. The inscription on the banner of the Erythraean sibyl quotes from Virgil, a pagan Latin author dubbed by the church as one of the “good” pagans who, perhaps inadvertently, forecast the coming of Christ: “He speaks with no mortal tongue, being inspired by power from on high.” The Cumaean sibyl’s banner flows with a quotation from Saint Augustine: “The King Most High shall come in human form to reign through all eternity.”
Patterns involving clusters of three architectural elements refer to the Holy Trinity. One such may be found in the small trefoil, a window resembling a three-leaf clover, inside a sculptural niche crowned in a gothic pointed arch. Hanging in the niche is a bronze water pot above a shallow basin, a reference to the consecrated wine poured out at Mass. A towel hangs in the sculptural niche. The decoration on the towel is reminiscent of the uniforms of altar boys. As with all altarpieces, this painting was literally meant for display above an altar, at which Mass would be performed. More than an object of beauty, it was also a meditative aid. Van Eyck cleverly inserted cross-references between the painted content of the altarpiece and the actual clergy performing Mass in front of it.
Saint John the Evangelist, painted in a gray-scale to suggest that this is a statue of the saint, not the saint himself
The bottom register of the closed altarpiece is, like the upper register, four panels across. The lower-middle panels depict Saint John the Baptist in the center left and Saint John the Evangelist in the center right. Both Johns are painted in a style called “grisaille”—a scaled monochrome, employed here to give the illusion that the painting is actually a stone sculpture. Van Eyck has not painted the two Saint Johns, but rather he has painted sculptures of the two Saint Johns.
An imaginary painted light source, coming from the top right of the panels, casts shadows behind the sculptural saints, indicating that they are, indeed, meant to be seen as statues in a shallow niche. Some art historians have suggested that van Eyck was the first painter to incorporate directed spotlighting, to create shadows and depth in such a way that painting could replicate sculpture, as in these two grisaille panels. This technique would be used almost universally in the Baroque period, a century and a half later. There is no extant earlier painting that incorporates the same effect, but given all of the works of art that have been lost over the centuries, it is difficult to declare art-historical “firsts” with certainty. Unless the galaxy of lost masterpieces is recovered from the ashes and hidden corners, the question marks remain.
Both of the painted sculptures of the Saint Johns stand on octagonal plinths. The dramatically rendered drapery of their garments is reminiscent of the unusually naturalistic drapery cut out of marble by Donatello in his Saint Mark sculpture, which, like his Saint George, decorates the exterior of Orsanmichele in Florence. This second visual link to Orsanmichele is a further clue to suggest that van Eyck may have traveled to Italy to admire the works of Donatello.
A painted statue of Saint John the Baptist, cradling a lamb, the symbol of Christ, in his arms
The Revelation of Saint John the Evangelist provides the theme of the central interior panel: the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb. The painted image of Saint John the Baptist carrying a lamb is of particular significance to the city of Ghent. The Baptist is the patron saint of Ghent. He is depicted on the earliest known seal of the city. The Lamb of God, Agnus Dei, the subject of The Adoration of the Mystic Lamb, is the image on the earliest known counter seal. A later city seal depicts John the Baptist carrying a lamb, as he does in van Eyck’s panel. Ghent’s wealth, having come primarily from the wool industry, is one reason for the symbolic use of a lamb in the city’s seal and iconography. Indeed, the original name of the church for which The Ghent Altarpiece was painted was the Church of Saint John. Its name was changed to the Church of Saint Bavo only in 1540, nineteen years before it was granted the status of cathedral, in honor of a local saint.
There was originally a predella to The Ghent Altarpiece, a strip of small square panels that ran across the base of the altarpiece. Documents from the time refer to the predella as depicting Limbo, but we know nothing more about it. The predella itself was irrevocably damaged when the altarpiece was badly cleaned by the painter Jan van Scorel, sometime before 1550. The bad cleaning resulted in the predella being discarded, placed in storage, and eventually lost. From the late sixteenth century on, The Ghent Altarpiece has remained incomplete.
Portrait of the patron who paid for The Ghent Altarpiece, Joos Vijd
Who paid for the creation of this altarpiece? Depicted on the far left and far right are the donors, who funded both the establishment of the chapel that houses the altarpiece and the painting of the altarpiece itself. On the far left panel is a portrait, wrinkled and accurate to life, of Joos Vijd (whose name was written a variety of ways, including the more exotic Jodocus Vydt), a wealthy knight and local Ghent politician. His wife, Elisabeth Borluut (sometimes spelled Burluut), is portrayed opposite him, also kneeling in prayer, in the far right panel. They are almost life-sized, painted as God made them, with none of the idealization employed by past artists, who would either “clean up” the less attractive aspects of those portrayed or paint them in a generic manner, bereft of identifiable characteristics. This warts-and-all portrait realism was another of van Eyck’s great innovations.
Van Eyck’s realism, described by the founder of modern art history, Jacob Burckhardt, as “supreme perfection at its very first attempt,” both displays his artistic skill and emphasizes the humility of the donors who were willing to be preserved for all eternity as they truly looked, without any painterly plastic surgery—even if they were not so humble as to refrain from including themselves in the painting that they commissioned to demonstrate their wealth and piety.
Portraiture as a distinct artistic genre arose in the first decades of the fifteenth century, a time when Humanism emphasized the importance of individual human life, and led to the commemoration and glorification of individuals—people who were neither kings nor biblical figures but instead aristocrats, clergy, merchants, intellectuals, and artists who believed their lives on earth had meaning and value. A portrait, either alone in a panel painting or with other donors’ images in a large religious work like this one, was a historical record, a way of preserving one’s name, likeness, and legacy.
Portrait of the patron’s wife, Elisabeth Borluut
Van Eyck began his portraits by sketching in silverpoint (literally drawing with a piece of silver) on paper in the presence of the sitter. The sketch would include the outlines of the face and the key lines of the facial features, shadowed with cross-hatching. He would make notes to himself in his native Mosan jargon (the dialect from the region of Maaseyck) in the margins of his silverpoint drawing about color, garment texture, and similar details. He would then transfer the drawing onto his gessoed panel using a mechanical enlargement technique to alter the size.
There were two common methods of mechanical transfer used by Renaissance artists. The first method involved drawing a grid over one’s sketch, and then drawing a grid with larger squares onto the support of the panel onto which one would paint. The artist could then copy the lines contained in each square of the grid over his sketch into the corresponding larger-scale square of his grid on the panel, enlarging the lines piece by piece. In the second method, the drawing would be placed over the panel and pierced along the important lines, leaving a mark on the surface underneath the drawing. The resulting marks on the panel could be used as a reference point to draw lines around them in a larger scale on th
e panel itself. This is the method most likely used by van Eyck, as his only extant drawing contains marks of transfer.
The centerpiece of The Adoration of the Mystic Lamb is found in the lower central panel of the open altar and is the most important element to understanding the work as a whole. This panel alone measures 134.3 by 237.5 centimeters (4.4 by 7.8 feet) and spans the width of three other panels. Its subject is taken from the Revelation of Saint John the Evangelist, the last book of the New Testament.
The scene is set in a vast, idyllic flowery meadow embowered by trees and hedges. Here van Eyck’s inordinate patience and attention to detail are on full display. Most of the plants, bushes, and trees are depicted with enough accuracy as to be identifiable to botanists. This cannot be any real field, as the combination of plant life, running the gamut from roses to lilies to cypresses to oaks to palm trees, could not coexist in one natural habitat. There is no sunlight, but rather the Holy Spirit, as a white dove, emanates light and bathes the scene in a midday glow. As is written in the Revelation of Saint John, “I saw the Spirit descending from Heaven like a dove.”
The scene is viewed from on high, looking down at the sweep of meadow filled with hundreds of figures. Basic perspectival lines draw our eyes to the sacrificial altar at the center, on which stands the Lamb of God, Agnus Dei, to which the attention of everyone in the meadow, save one individual, is directed.
On the central panel’s two penduli—swaths of red velvet draping down the side of the altar—is written Ihesus Via and Veritas Vita, “Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” also a quote from the Gospel of John. Scroll down the center of the panel, and we come to a fountain, the Fons Vitae or Fountain of the Water of Life, symbolic of the celebration of Mass, out of which flows endless grace for the faithful. The painted water streams out of the fountain through a gargoyle-mouthed drain that suggests that the water might even flow out of the painting itself and spill onto the stone altar beneath it, transcending the boundary between the painted reality and the chapel in which the viewers of the painting stand. Around the stone edge of the octagonal fountain (the base of which should recall the painted plinths on which stand the two Saint John statues on the other side of this very panel) is carved Hic Est Fons Aque Vite Procedens De Sede Dei + Agni: “This is the Fountain of the Water of Life proceeding out of the throne of God and the Lamb,” a quotation from the Book of Revelation.
The central panel of The Ghent Altarpiece, referred to as the Adoration of the Mystic Lamb
Angels with jewel-colored wings kneel in prayer around the Lamb on the altar, carrying the instruments of Christ’s passion: the cross, the Crown of Thorns, and the column at which he was flogged. Their white robes resemble those worn by altar boys, who would participate in the Mass held in the chapel beneath the painting. Even the multicolored wings of the angels have a symbolic origin. Two stories relate the colorful wings of birds to Catholic iconography: The origin of one is based on the misconception that a peacock’s flesh does not decompose after death. The peacock was, therefore, associated with the body of Christ, resurrected before it had a chance to decompose. The other reference is to a different colorful bird—the parrot. Another odd rationale for Mary’s having been a pregnant virgin ran: If a parrot can be taught to say “Ave Maria,” then why can’t Mary be a pregnant virgin? This sort of pregnant logic pretty well silenced the questioning masses back in the Middle Ages and, as porous as the argument may sound today, resulted in the depiction of parrots in religious painting throughout the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.
The angels in the garb of altar boys swing censers, spreading powdered incense over the Lamb. The censers are caught in midair. The central scene is a snapshot, a frozen moment of action. In the Renaissance, particularly in Italy, painters preferred to depict their figures in stable, geometric poses that suggested calm, sculptural, eternal permanence. In the Baroque period, two centuries after van Eyck painted, particularly those artists who emulated Caravaggio favored dynamic, unstable tableaux, portraying figures at the moment of highest drama and movement—a cup falling off a table, a head peeling off of a severed neck. Van Eyck provides the High Renaissance stability in every element of his central painting, save for those swinging censers, which forecast Baroque dynamism, there to remind us that it is a moment we see, not an unmoving eternity.
The field is filled with figures. As is written in Revelation 7:9-10, the “great multitude, which no man could number, of all nations and kindred, and people, and tongues” surround the Lamb of God in the fields of paradise. In the case of this painting, the great multitude can be numbered. To be precise, there are 46 prophets and patriarchs (if you count heads and hats), 46 apostles and clergy (if you count portions of tonsured heads), 32 confessors (the sum total of tonsures and mitres), and 46 female saints (counting faces and variously colored head gear)—170 total individuals, plus 16 angels.
Each figure, particularly those from the foreground groups (the prophets and patriarchs in the left foreground and the apostles and clergy to the right) are painted with identifiable portrait faces. In most contemporary Italian paintings, portraits of individual patrons aside, figures such as saints were portrayed in a generic manner, with few if any distinguishing features beneath their beards. But van Eyck has provided knit brows and baggy eyes, faces full of character. One of the best tests for the vividness of a painted face is to ask oneself, Would I recognize this painted individual if I saw the person walking down the street? Unlike most Italian painted faces of the period, van Eyck’s faces could be picked out of a crowd.
While most of the figures in the meadow have not been identified as particular historical individuals, a good number of them have. This recognition does not come from a portrait likeness, as no record exists of what these people really looked like. Iconographic attributes, such as the hagiographic icons of saints, act as badges or name tags that help us recognize key figures. Among the female saints, all of whom carry palm fronds, the symbol of having been martyred, we can locate: Saint Agnes, who carries a lamb as her hagiographic icon; Saint Barbara, who holds a tower (in which she was locked for refusing to marry a pagan); Saint Dorothy carrying a basket of flowers; and Saint Ursula with her arrow (the instrument of her execution at the hand of the Huns). Two members of the ensemble are abbesses, recognizable because they carry crosiers. White lilies bloom near this cluster of saintly women, symbolizing their virginity.
Among the apostles and clergy are three popes wearing the papal tiara: Martin V, Alexander V, and Gregory XII. Saints Peter, Paul, and John are present, as are Saint Stephen and Saint Livinius. Among the prophets and patriarchs to the left, one may find the prophet Isaiah, dressed in blue and carrying a flowering twig, referring to his prophecy: “There shall come forth a rod out of the stem of the tree of Jesse,” Jesse being the forefather of the Old Testament King David, who in turn was considered, in apocryphal sources, to have been an ancestor of Christ. Perhaps surprisingly Virgil is also present, the only recognizable pagan in the field of paradise. He wears a crown of laurel leaves, the symbol of poetic excellence (from which the term laureate is derived).
Despite the elevated vantage through which we are shown the scene, and despite the vast number of figures, van Eyck’s level of detail is staggering. Intricacies are hidden in the mass of bodies that may only be seen upon close examination—even with a magnifying glass in hand they are difficult to pick out.
Take, for example, the three Hebrew letters painted in gold into the band around the red hat of the gentleman standing to the rear of the prophets. This was first noted by Canon Gabriel van den Gheyn, a brave clergyman of Saint Bavo Cathedral whose heroism would preserve The Lamb from theft and possible destruction during the First World War. Van den Gheyn published an article in 1924 noting the Hebrew letters yod feh aleph, which he thought were an abbreviation for the word sabaoth, which means “hosts” or “armies,” as in the “Lord of Hosts.” Van den Gheyn’s rationale that these letters represented this word was n
ot accepted by later historians, but the Hebrew letters were duly noted.
Yod feh aleph does not spell out a word in Hebrew, though, as we will see, it may be a transliteration rather than a literal word. The nearest word that would make sense is yod feh aleph ramish, meaning “He will beautify,” a line from Psalms 4:149, which contains one more letter. A line from Psalms appears in the panel of the angelic musicians in the upper register, so this reference corresponds theologically to the rest of the altarpiece. If that one extra letter were present, the phrase “He will beautify” would make sense—and yet the Hebrew letters are so small as to make it nearly impossible to tell.
Van Eyck was at once coy and proud. He sometimes hid his signature, yet did so in plain sight, as in his work The Arnolfini Wedding Portrait, which he signed right in the center of the painting as a witness to the marriage ceremony, thought to involve Giovanni Arnolfini and Giovanna Cenami. He incorporated a trompe l’oeil painted phrase, his personal motto, into the frame of his (Self) Portrait in a Red Turban: Ais Ich Kan (“As well as I can”), knowing full well that what he had created was perfection itself. This was also a means of self-aggrandizement because, traditionally, only nobles had mottos. So while the phrase “He will beautify” is a legitimate inclusion in this religious work, it could also be a statement about van Eyck’s painting ability—he will beautify all that he touches with his brush.
Hebrew letters hidden in the band around a prophet’s red hat
Van Eyck loved ambiguity, lacing his works with discussion points for even the most educated of his viewers. If the gold letters on the hat band are indeed yod feh aleph, this may be a subtle means of signing the work. One scholar has suggested that yod feh aleph could be transliterated into Jan van Eyck’s initials. Yod is the “y” sound of Jan, feh is the Flemish pronunciation of “van” (which sounds more like “fahn”), and aleph is the start of Eyck.
