Thompson, Kate: A handbook to the public picture galleries of Europe: with a brief sketch of the history of the various schools of painting, from the 13th century to the 18th inclusive (London: Macmillan and Co., 1880)

OF PAINTING IN FLANDERS.

95

now preserved in the Museum at Dijon. Most interesting
are these examples in the history of Flemish art, since
they exhibit the earliest efforts to produce a faithful
representation of nature, and that minute attention to
detail which eventually became a leading characteristic of
this school.
In the year 1366 was born at Maeseyck Hubert van
Eyck, the first great name in the annals of Netherlandish
art, who perhaps did more than any other master to
advance the practice of painting in his native land. He
not only introduced a hitherto unknown mode of painting
in oil, and improved the existing colours, but in the treat-
ment of his subjects he formed a style differing from that
of his predecessors, because he was not content with re-
peating the old conventional characters, but aimed in his
work to produce a close imitation of Nature. Hubert's
greatest production is the celebrated ' Adoration of the
Lamb,' a large altarpiece in the Vydts Chapel of the
Cathedral of St. Bavon at Ghent (Plate XXI., 5). With
the exception of the original wings, formed by six beauti-
ful tall panels, painted on each face, now in the Berlin
Museum, Nos. 512-23, and the two outer compartments
which are in the Brussels Museum, No. 13, the whole of
this grand work remains in its original situation. The
missing portions, which, however, are very important—are
replaced at Ghent by copies made by Michael Coxie. It
was begun by Hubert in 1420, but upon his death in 1426
Jan van Eyck, his younger but not less distinguished
brother, and also his best pupil, undertook to finish the
work, and completed it in 1432. Certain it is that this
was the finest production of the age both as regards com-
position and colouring ; while the delicacy of the modelling
and the careful rendering of detail prove the painter to
have been a master in his art. Not only are the larger
figures grandly and broadly painted, although remarkable
for high finish, but the landscape also, which forms a large
part of the work, is executed in the most admirable manner.
A composition only inferior to this (but smaller in size) is
the painting of the ' Fount of Salvation,' or rather ' Triumph
of Christianity,' in the Madrid Gallery, No. 2188, the

Breeder-
lam.

Hubert van
Eyck.