The Crucifixion; The Last Judgment

The Crucifixion; The Last Judgment

The Crucifixion; The Last Judgment

Artist:Jan van Eyck (Netherlandish, Maaseik ca. 1390–1441 Bruges) and Workshop Assistant
Date:ca. 1440–41
Medium:Oil on canvas, transferred from wood
Dimensions:Each 22 1/4 x 7 2/3 in. (56.5 x 19.7 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Fletcher Fund, 1933

Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, considered Van Eyck (his court painter) unequalled in his “art and science.” In fact, Van Eyck's expansive yet microcosmic paintings seem observed through both a microscope and a telescope. In The Crucifixion, he evokes a remarkable range of emotions among the crowds, seen against a landscape depicting an imagined Jerusalem; in 1426 he made a trip across the Alps during a diplomatic mission to Italy and the Holy Lands. He gives an equally palpable form to the horrors of the Last Judgment. The frames are original, with damaged inscriptions in Latin and Middle Dutch.

Provenance

Prince D. P. Tatistcheff, Vienna and St. Petersburg (by 1841–45; purchased while he was Ambassador to Spain from a convent near Madrid [or near Burgos?], as by Jan van Eyck; bequeathed to Hermitage); Czar Nicholas I, the Hermitage, St. Petersburg (from 1845); The Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg (1917/18–1933); [Knoedler, New York, 1933; sold to MMA]

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