Hulin de Loo, Georges: Early Flemish paintings in the Renders Collection at Bruges: exhibited at the Belgian Exhibition, Burlington House, January 1927 (London, 1927)

MEMLING * THE VIRGIN WITH' THE CHILD AND
AN ANGEL, IN A ROOM. *-:—-j-:-1---
!tOa\ panel: 22 centimeters high by 13,5 centimeters ivide.it

THIS work would seem to have been done by Memling
in his young days, or at any rate, before the first
of those paintings to which an approximate date can be
affixed, namely : the triptych of Sir John Donne belonging
to the Duke of Devonshire (between 1466 and 1468), and
the large Last Judgment of Dantzjig (between 1467 and 1472).
Indeed in this beautiful yet so simple panel, bearing the stamp
of a naive grace, we note a craft and colouring which reveals
Memling’s own touch, as well as details borrowed straight from
Van der Weyden and from Thierry Bouts in far greater
number than in any of the other works of the Master. We
are therefore justified in saying that our picture belongs to a
period in which the rising artist was still endeavouring
it Judging from its sober composition, this panel appears to
be one of the oldest specimens of those pictures of the Virgin
seated on a throne, repeatedly produced by Memling during
his lifetime, but unfortunately without dating them. In that
case our Virgin would have been painted even before the one
in the Berlin Museum (Klassiker der Kunst, p. 134) which.