Rolin Madonna
|
| The Madonna of the Chancellor Nicolaus Rolin |
|---|
| Jan van Eyck , around 1435 |
| oil on wood |
| 66 × 62 cm |
| Musee du Louvre |
Rolin-Madonna or The Madonna of Chancellor Nicolas Rolin is a painting by the painter Jan van Eyck from around 1435. The picture is 66 x 62 cm and hangs in the Louvre in Paris .
Motif
The picture shows the interior of a palace, with a view of a city in a river valley. Chancellor Nicolas Rolin kneels with clasped hands at a prayer chair in front of Mary , who holds out the baby Jesus to him. The boy blesses the Chancellor with his right hand and holds an orb in the other . A floating angel crowns Mary, indicating her status as Queen of Heaven.
interpretation
The palace represents the heavenly Jerusalem , in which no mediation between man and God is necessary; the city behind the pillar arch is not to be equated with this, but it also belongs to the messianic world. The alignment of the cathedral and the shadow of the staff held by a figure in the center of the picture suggest a source of light in the northwest. The Book of Hours Rolin does not state the time, but in the mantle of the Madonna a prayer is embroidered, which for Marienofficium belongs, namely to Matins - it is in the monastic Divine Office prayed between midnight and early morning. In the Mariengarten in front of the palace roses , peonies , lilies of the valley , irises and columbines all bloom .
Two men stand on the battlements behind the Mariengarten, one of whom is looking down at the city and the other is facing the viewer. This second figure (in a blue skirt and with a red turban) holds a staff and is thus recognizable as a court official; she is identified by some with the painter himself. The color and shape of the turban match that of the man in the red turban adopted as a self-portrait .
research
The numerous details are not yet included in the signature , i.e. the linear conception on the primer of the wooden panel. With infrared reflectography, changes are also visible: the blessing arm of the boy Jesus was added later by the artist, but a purse was visible on Rolin's belt. In 1972, H. Roosen-Runge provided important information on the iconography of the image for art-historical research, in which he examined the Madonna's coat hem filled with gold letters and connected it with passages from the Latin prayer book, which was known at the time, as well as the two men at the bridge identified as "heralds" who functioned as preachers and teachers in the Middle Ages, and made other symbolic interpretations of the picture content. He also provides contemporary sources on the identity of the chancellor.
literature
- Christiane Kruse, Felix Thürlemann (ed.): Portrait, landscape, interior. Jan van Eyck's Rolin Madonna in an aesthetic context (= literature and anthropology. 4). Gunther Narr, Tübingen 1999, ISBN 3-8233-5703-4 .
supporting documents
- ↑ a b c d Anita Albus : The art of the arts. Memories of painting (= The Other Library. 145). Eichborn, Frankfurt am Main 1997, ISBN 3-8218-4145-1 , pp. 19-37: Chapter III (view from paradise).
- ↑ Rose-Marie Hagen, Rainer Hagen: Masterpieces in detail. Volume 1. Taschen, Cologne a. a. 2006, ISBN 3-8228-4787-9 , pp. 32-37.
- ^ Johannes Taubert: For the art-historical evaluation of scientific painting studies. Siegl, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-935643-08-X .
- ↑ a b Heinz Roosen-Runge: The Rolin Madonna by Jan van Eyck. Form and content . Dr. Ludwig Reichert, Wiesbaden 1972, ISBN 3-920153-19-7 , p. 17 : "... who is described by the chroniclers of his time as the most respected, but also most feared figure of the Burgundian Empire."
