This was formerly thought to be a marriage portrait of a rich Dutch merchant and his heavily pregnant wife, but that view has now fallen from favour. For one thing, the woman is not pregnant but is holding her dress in the style of the time.
There is a lot of detail in this early 15th century oil painting (it dates from 1434), in which the artist was experimenting with the medium and demonstrating how it could be used to portray subtle variations of light and shade. In particular there is a mirror in the background in which the artist can be seen, and he signs the painting in a typically witty way in the form of graffiti on the wall that translates as: “Jan Van Eyck was here 1434”.
A
cartoon was a full-scale drawing on paper that was intended to be a template
for a painting, with the outline being pricked through to create an outline on
the panel. However, this cartoon, which dates from about 1500, appears not to
have been used for this purpose as it is intact, but also incomplete. The
drawing was made using charcoal and chalk and measures 56 inches (141 cm) by 41
inches (105 cm).
The cartoon depicts four characters, namely the Virgin Mary, her mother St Anne, and Jesus and John the Baptist as infants. Mary sits on her mother’s lap, which was a common way of portraying them in medieval art, but still adds an intimate touch to a family group that is both symbolic and naturalistic. There are no halos here, but exquisitely beautiful drawings of real people.
Holbein
was a German who spent much of his working life as court painter to King Henry
VIII. In 1533 he painted this extraordinarily detailed double portrait of Jean de
Dinteville and Georges de Selve, who were on a diplomatic mission from France
One very good reason for seeing this painting “in situ” is that there is a very strange object painted across the floor in the foreground. By standing at the correct angle to the canvas the visitor can see that this is a skull, painted as a “memento mori” to say that even the rich and powerful must meet their end eventually.
“The Ambassadors” is a very impressive work, being almost
square at about 82 inches (208 cm) each way, such that the portraits are
virtually lifesize.
The room that houses this painting contains seven
Turners, five Constables, four Gainsboroughs, and more. If time is really short,
you could spend your whole Gallery visit in this one room and come away having
had a cultural overdose!
Turner painted this canvas (which measures 48 inches by 36 inches (122 x 91 cm)) in 1839, having witnessed the towing up-river of one of the ships that helped win the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805. Against a flat calm sea and glorious sunset, the ghostly white ship is towed by a busy steam tugboat, belching fire and steam into the sky. It is one of the most evocative scenes ever painted, and one that the viewer can never forget.
This is another painting that is instantly recognisable. The
scene is of an idyllic part of England
where the River Stour forms the boundary between Suffolk
and Essex . A cart stands in the shallow river
as the carters pause in their work of bringing in the harvest from the meadows
in the distance. To one side stands a cottage that is still there today, some
190 years after Constable painted the scene in 1821.
Despite the immediacy of the scene, Constable worked from
sketches to assemble the finished work in his London
This enormous painting of a horse always draws the eye.
The canvas is massive, measuring 115 inches (292 cm) by 97 inches (246 cm) and
shows nothing but a chestnut horse against a plain brown background. Nobody ever
painted horses better than Stubbs, and this painting (dating from 1762) is one
of his best. Whistlejacket’s eye is turned towards the viewer, and one can tell
that this is a horse with attitude!
Stubbs studied the anatomy of the horse in considerable
detail, and his paintings reflect this. Indeed, so realistic was this painting
that, when it was nearly completed, Whistlejacket (a racehorse owned by the
Marquess of Rockingham) caught sight of it and tried to charge at what he
thought was a real horse.
This is also known as “The Rokeby Venus” from the house
of its previous owner before the painting was acquired by the Gallery.
Female nudes are very rare in Spanish art of this period
(c. 1650) because of the disapproval of the Catholic Church, and this is the only
known nude painting by Velazquez. Venus lies on a couch looking at herself in a
mirror held by her winged son Cupid. We can therefore see her face in the
mirror as well the curves of her body seen from behind. The beauty of the
painting lies in the composition and the many variations of skin tone on both
Venus and Cupid.
This is another world-famous painting, although it is one
of four that Van Gogh painted on this subject in August and September 1888,
intended to decorate the room of his friend Paul Gauguin with whom he hoped to
start a new partnership. For Van Gogh, the sunflower was a symbol of happiness,
as was the colour yellow.
However, the timeless quality of this painting comes from
the realization that these sunflowers are past their best. None of the bunch is
fresh, and some have lost all their petals to leave just the seedheads behind. There is, however, beauty in decay and the
promise of new life from the seeds that can only ripen after the flowers have
died. The message of the painting is therefore equivocal.
The viewer can see how the artist has used thick
brushstrokes (impasto) to produce a variety of textures in this painting.
And the rest?
Needless to say, this brief survey barely scratches the
surface. One quick visit to the National Gallery cannot be enough and you will
want to return as soon as possible. There is no charge for admission (except to
special exhibitions) so you can certainly afford to!
© John Welford
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