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DOI Artikel:Ratkowska, Paulina: The remains of an altarpiece with the legend of St. John the Baptist: an unpublished work of the Franco-Gothic Style in the National Museum in Warsaw
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.18818#0011
4. Detail of the fig. 1, the Maid 5. Detail of the fig. 3, the Feast of Herod
composition of particular scenes betrays a predilection of the artist toward the rhytmized ar-
rangement: in the Feast of Herod the purple of cloth and the nimbus of the King calls off to
red of the dress of Salome, wbile the rosę mantle of Herodiadę, separating the figures of her
husband and the girl, echoes the rosę dress of the playing maiden standing close to Herod and
lost in sweet sounds of her viol. In the scene of the Calling of the First Disciples blue of
St John the Baptist’s mantle finds its counterpart in the blue mantle of St John the Eyangelist
next to Christ, while the rosę gown of Jesus refers to rosę of the mantle of St Andrew, who is
stepping behind the Youngest Disciple. It may be admitted that the artist kept this principle
also on the opposite pair of the wings of the retable (on the right side). Thus, we would have
here on the lost narrower wing in the upper compartment the light element, most probably
the rosę one, as a counterpart of the body of Jesus in the waters of Jordan, and in the lower
compartment the blue element, which corresponded to blue of the mantle of the Precursor
in the scene of the Beheading. On the reverse of the narrower wing red of the gown of St Paul
witb his blue beard delimited with the thick outline contrasts in a still archaic manner with
the yellow background of the central part of the painting.9
With all his interests in color the artist of the Warsaw panels is to a greater even extent
a designer masterly making use of the linę. The infra red photograplis of the wings facilitate
9. For the custom of the placing of the figures of the Princes of Churcli on the reverses of retables see Ars Hispaniae,
op. cit., VI, fig. 258.
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composition of particular scenes betrays a predilection of the artist toward the rhytmized ar-
rangement: in the Feast of Herod the purple of cloth and the nimbus of the King calls off to
red of the dress of Salome, wbile the rosę mantle of Herodiadę, separating the figures of her
husband and the girl, echoes the rosę dress of the playing maiden standing close to Herod and
lost in sweet sounds of her viol. In the scene of the Calling of the First Disciples blue of
St John the Baptist’s mantle finds its counterpart in the blue mantle of St John the Eyangelist
next to Christ, while the rosę gown of Jesus refers to rosę of the mantle of St Andrew, who is
stepping behind the Youngest Disciple. It may be admitted that the artist kept this principle
also on the opposite pair of the wings of the retable (on the right side). Thus, we would have
here on the lost narrower wing in the upper compartment the light element, most probably
the rosę one, as a counterpart of the body of Jesus in the waters of Jordan, and in the lower
compartment the blue element, which corresponded to blue of the mantle of the Precursor
in the scene of the Beheading. On the reverse of the narrower wing red of the gown of St Paul
witb his blue beard delimited with the thick outline contrasts in a still archaic manner with
the yellow background of the central part of the painting.9
With all his interests in color the artist of the Warsaw panels is to a greater even extent
a designer masterly making use of the linę. The infra red photograplis of the wings facilitate
9. For the custom of the placing of the figures of the Princes of Churcli on the reverses of retables see Ars Hispaniae,
op. cit., VI, fig. 258.
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