The Virgin at the Fountain

Jan van Eyck

1439

Panel

7 1/2 x 4 3/4 inches

Musée Royal des Beaux-Arts, Antwerp.

van Eyck here employs the cloth-of-honor composition found in medieval manuscripts, which simultaneously highlights the central figures and also creates a form of forced perspective — a device used by the early Pre-Raphaelites. — George P. Landow

References

Cutler, Charles D. Northern Paintingfrom Pucelle to Bruegel: Fourteenth, Fifteenth, and Sixteenth Centuries. New York: Holt, Rhinehart, and Winston, 1973.

Panofsky, Erwin. Early Netherlandish Painting: Its Origins and Character [1953]. 2 vols. New York: Harper and Row, 1971.

Van Puyvelde, Leo. Flemish Painting from the Van Eycks to Metsys. Trans. Alan Kendall. New York: McGraw-Hill, [1968?]

Last modified December 2001