Enguerrand Quarton

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Coronation of Mary, Musée du Petit Palais , Avignon (1454)

Enguerrand Quarton , also called Enguerrand Charrenton (* around 1415 near Laon , † 1466 in Avignon ) was a French painter and illuminator of the late Middle Ages. Along with Nicolas Froment , he is considered the main representative of the Avignon School .

Life

Almost nothing is known about the life and career of Enguerrand Quarton. Because of the stylistic references of his painting to the old Dutch painting , training in Flanders is accepted. Around 1444 he settled in Provence ; his name appears first in Aix , then in Arles and finally in Avignon and Villeneuve-lès-Avignon . Six contracts for work and services from the years 1446 to 1466 have been preserved in the archives of both cities; Most of the pictures in this regard are lost, only the Coronation of Mary from 1454 has survived.

Pietà of Villeneuve

Pieta de Villeneuve, Louvre , Paris (around 1455)

In the history of art, Enguerrand Quarton was listed as an unknown late medieval painter who was ascribed the Pietà von Villeneuve until the early 20th century . The panel painting on wood shows the mother of Jesus mourning the body of her son, removed from the cross, who is lying across her lap with the wounds and his right arm hanging limply. She is accompanied by the disciple Johannes and Maria Magdalena . In the lower left corner of the picture the unknown donor of the picture is shown dressed in a spiritual garb ; Above it is an oriental-looking cityscape (probably Jerusalem is meant) while otherwise the background is painted as a gold background in medieval tradition . Because of its psychologically and physiologically mature painting style, the work is counted among the most important French paintings of the 15th century.

Prosper Mérimée , while working as inspector of the new French monument office, discovered the Pieta de Villeneuve more or less by chance in the middle of other paintings in the village church of Villeneuve-lès-Avignon in 1834 and recognized it as the work of a painter from the Avignon School . The picture was exhibited publicly in Paris in 1904 and purchased as an anonymous master's picture by the Musée du Louvre in Paris. It can still be seen there today and is considered to be one of the most important works in the collection of medieval painting.

More panel paintings

Book illumination

Miniature from the Namur Book of Hours

Quarton, whose style is characterized by characteristic features of coloring , design and iconography , has also been attributed to a number of illuminated manuscripts by research. François Avril of the Bibliothèque nationale de France was the first scientist to express such assumptions in 1977. In a document from 1444 Quarton and Barthélemy d'Eyck are recorded in Aix-en-Provence , and an unfinished book of hours dates from this period , which is now in the Pierpont Morgen Library and on which both worked closely together. The miniatures in the Book of Hours are probably drawn by d'Eyck, they were colored by Quarton, who also completed some of the miniatures in the Book of Hours. Another book of hours of similar quality is kept in the Huntington Library in San Marino near Los Angeles .

A missal from 1466 in the French National Library contains two full-page illustrations and a number of illuminated initials . The Boucicaut Book of Hours also contains two full-page miniatures attributed to Quarenton, which were created in the 1460s. Furthermore miniatures in the book of hours by Naumur are attributed to him.

literature

  • M. Marignane: Le maître de la Pietà de Villeneuve, de l'Annonciation d'Aix ... révélé, Engverrand Charonton. Povolozky, Paris 1938, ( digitized version ).
  • Charles Sterling: Enguerrand Quarton. Le peintre de la “Pietà” d'Avignon. Réunion des Musées Nationaux, Paris 1983, ISBN 2-7118-0229-9 (vérifié par Nicole Reynaud et Michel Hayez).
  • François Avril, Nicole Reynaud: Les Manuscrits à peintures en France. 1440-1520. Flammarion et al., Paris 1993, ISBN 2-08-012176-6 .
  • Dominique Thiebaut, Philippe Lorentz, François René Martin: Les Primitifs français, Découvertes et redécouvertes. Editions de la Réunion des musées nationaux, Paris 2004.

Web links

Commons : Enguerrand Quarton  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Enguerrand Quarton - training
  2. ^ Enguerrand Quarton - Pietà
  3. ↑ Enguerrand Quarton - Protective Mantle Madonna
  4. ^ Enguerrand Quarton - Coronation of Mary
  5. ^ Enguerrand Quarton - Requin retable
personal data
SURNAME Quarton, Enguerrand
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Charrenton, Enguerrand; Master of the Pietà de Villeneuve
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French painter and illuminator of the late Middle Ages
DATE OF BIRTH 1412 or 1415
PLACE OF BIRTH Laon
DATE OF DEATH 1466
Place of death Avignon