Saturday, February 18, 2017

Panel Paintings from 16th-century Europe

Fra Bartolomeo
Madonna and Child with four Angels
ca. 1514
oil on panel, transferred to canvas
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Gerard David
Virgin Embracing the Dead Christ, with Garlands
ca. 1500-1520
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Il Sodoma
Stigmatization of St Catherine of Siena
ca. 1510
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Tobias Verhaecht and Gillis Coignet
Landscape with St John the Evangelist on Patmos
1598
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Saint John reputedly wrote the Book of Revelation  the final book in the Bible, as we know it – while on the Greek island of Patmos. In the Flemish panel above by Verhaecht and Coignet, Patmos is represented as a site of wonders. The painting contains selected monsters and celestial forms from among those described in John's text, yet reduced and attenuated, like toys in daydreams  a vaporous mental landscape, more than any credible geography. Bits from John's original descriptions as they appear in the 1611 King James Bible are quoted below  

"And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy. And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion . . ."

"And after these things I saw four angels standing on the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree."

"And the shapes of the locusts were like unto horses prepared unto battle; and on their heads were as it were crowns of gold, and their faces were as the faces of men. And they had hair as the hair of women, and their teeth were as the teeth of lions. And they had breastplates, as it were breastplates of iron; and the sound of their wings was as the sound of chariots of many horses running to battle. And they had tails like unto scorpions, and there were stings in their tails: and their power was to hurt men five months."

circle of Lucas van Leyden
St Paul
ca. 1510-20
oil on panel
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

Palma Vecchio
Madonna and Child with Donors
ca. 1505
oil on panel, transferred to canvas
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Domenico Panetti
Portrait of a woman
ca. 1510
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Jan de Beer
Birth of the Virgin
ca. 1520
oil on panel
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid

Paolo da San Leocadio
Meeting of St Joachim and St Anne
ca. 1510-20
tempera and oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Bonifazio Veronese
Adoration of the Shepherds
ca. 1523-25
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Joos van Cleve
Infant Christ on Orb of the World
ca. 1530
oil on panel
Museo Thyssen-Bornesmisza, Madrid

Pieter Coecke van Aelst
Agony in the Garden
ca. 1527-30
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Jan Sanders van Hemessen
St Jerome
1543
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Pieter Aertsen
Trader in Game
1561
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Jacob de Backer
Three Ages of Man - An Allegory
before 1590
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg

Michiel Coxie
Annunciation
1580s
oil on panel
Hermitage, Saint Petersburg