Van Eyck to Gossaert: Towards a Northern Renaissance, published alongside the exhibition Jan Gossaert’s Renaissance at the National Gallery, 23 February – 30 May 2011, is a comprehensive account of the Renaissance in the Netherlands and the Low Countries.
Objects of beauty and prestige, early Netherlandish paintings were among the most widely sought-after works of the Renaissance. Their appeal lay partly in their materials and astonishing technical refinement, as well as their descriptive realism, emotional power and innovative subject matter.
Van Eyck to Gossaert: Towards a Northern Renaissance draws on the extensive collection of the National Gallery, and provides an essay and commentaries on over 50 selected works – all magnificently illustrated in colour. Van Eyck to Gossaert reveals how these artists exploited the medium of oil paint to depict an impossible level of detail – fascination with the surface of things, subtle depictions of light and an uncompromising attitude towards realistically depicting the human face – and explores the essential visual roles played by these paintings in various political and domestic, religious and secular contexts.
In their day, Netherlandish artists were internationally renowned; their mastery of the medium of oil paint was emulated across Europe while their interest in landscape and depiction of everyday subjects gave rise to new genres of art.
In addition to examining material and technical matters, Van Eyck to Gossaert: Towards a Northern Renaissance considers whether Northern European artists, like some of their Italian counterparts, laid claim to intellectual as well as artistic sophistication.
Susan Frances Jones examines one of the most glorious and innovative periods for Netherlandish painting, beginning in the early fifteenth century with Jan van Eyck, and ending in the late sixteenth century with Pieter Bruegel the Elder.