There is something about this painting that I find disconcerting, and it has both nothing and everything to do with the painting itself. The painting is The Virgin and Child with Chancellor Rolin, by Jan van Eyck. It was painted sometime between the years 1400-1450, presumably on commission from the chancellor, who seems to have been keen to put on display his devout humility to all who saw the work.
The artist himself was a true pioneer in the use of oil paints, and although he sometimes is credited with the invention of the medium, it was more the case that he refined and perfected it in terms of the use of the necessary clarifying oils and varnishes, and in the thorough preparation of the pigments. The use of an easel, now so synonymous with artists and painting, was also popularized by van Eyck, so his career marks something of a ‘before’ and ‘after’ period in the history of Western art.
In the painting we are shown the chancellor kneeling in devotion before the seated Madonna and Christ Child who holds an orb in his left hand and raises his other hand in blessing, while a blue-robed and fiery-winged angel holds a bejeweled crown above the Madonna’s head. The perspective of the elaborately-tiled floor leads our gaze out between the room’s [1] columns with their foliated capitals towards a small garden where a pair of magpies wander between beds of red blooms and white lilies. From there we may mount a short flight of steps up to a parapet where two figures who share the parapet with a pair of splendid peacocks look out over the view of a distant [2] city on a river, while in the far distance, beyond the city’s surrounding hills, a rolling mountain landscape is shrouded in haze.
It is a scene which defies its static subject matter, allowing us tangibly to sense the air of the 15th-century, not only through the richness and color in the costumes of its participants, but also in the soft diffuse interior lighting and in the atmosphere and detail of the distant landscape beyond. The painting is in every way a considered masterpiece by an artist who himself was an innovative master of his craft. It is not overly large in scale, being only an average arm’s length square. Neither is it unique in its subject matter, for there are [3] many such paintings on such a theme from the same time frame. To our 21st-century eyes the idea of including a wealthy patron actually in the company of religious deified persons might seem daringly presumptuous, even rather blasphemous, although to do so was simply a common convention of the artist’s time.
Why, then, should I find this painting disconcerting? When I look at the painting and others from the 15th-century and the later periods of the Renaissance and afterwards, the thought which preys on my mind is simply: are there any artists right here in the 21st-century who could actually achieve such results? I’m not referring to the religious sentiments present in these works, but to the virtuoso techniques employed in their creation, and the fidelity of the end results. Because if the answer is: “Well, maybe not” then we as a species – as a creative species – are in trouble. Such a conclusion would mean that we already have peaked. We have passed our zenith, and in response to the works of these creative giants of former centuries we now seem only to be able to produce [4] glass balloon dogs, [5] unmade beds, and [6] buildings wrapped in plastic.
And if you’re an admirer of such works, be honest: look at them dispassionately and ask yourself if you truly consider their creation to be on a more superior level of artistry to that which already has been accomplished back in the 15th-century. I emphasize the word ‘superior’, not ‘equal to’ or even ‘as good as’ or just ‘different from’, because we are here considering a possible evolutionary regression, and ‘as good as’ is not going to cut it. To go one step further: During my career I used to be paid good money for producing the sorts of portraits that now can be created with [7] AI. I have seen them, and I honestly cannot tell that they were not created by an artist using conventional brushes and paint, albeit a rather mediocre one. "AI.. could spell the end of the human race." Not my words, but those of the late Professor Stephen Hawking. I’m grateful that I’m now retired.
HAWKWOOD
Artist: Jan van Eyck
Work: The Virgin and Child with Chancellor Rolin. Between the years 1400-1450.
Medium: oils on wood
Location: The Louvre, Paris
Open the image below in a new tab to view a large scan of the painting.
Notes:
[1] The notable divisions of space between the columns are intended to be symbolic of the Holy Trinity.
[2] The city portrayed by van Eyck is a generic northern European city, rather than being a specific place.
[3] These include the works of such artists as Hugo van der Goes, Lucas van Leyden, Quintin Massijs, Hans Memling, Rogier van der Weyden, and those artists whose names are lost to us but whose works still survive, such as the ‘Master of the Legend of the Holy Lucia’, and ‘Master E.S.’
[4] Jeff Koons’ Balloon Dog in various examples.
[5] Tracy Emin’s My Bed installation shows her own unmade bed.
[6] Christo Vladimirov Javacheff and Jeanne-Claude Denat de Guillebon, known collectively as ‘Christo’, were known for wrapping up such structures as the Arc de Triomphe in Paris and the Reichstag building in Berlin.
[7] ‘Created with AI’: created with artificial intelligence. That is: an artefact that has been produced wholly and independently by digital algorithms, without any human input.
Sources:
Holger Borchert, Till: Van Eyck tot Dürer, De Vlaamse primitieven & Centraal-Europa, 1430-1530 ('Van Eyck to Dürer: The Flemish Primitives and Central Europe, 1430-1530'). Lannoo, 2010.
Leman Hare, T: The World’s Greatest Paintings: Selected Masterpieces of Famous Art Galleries, vol. III. Odhams Press Ltd., c1935.
