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The Painting St. John The
Baptist, St. Barbara and Two
Donors of the St. Martin Church
in Bratislava: The Case of a
Corrected Image
Ingrid Ciulisova, The Slovak
Academy of Sciences-Institute of
Art History
In 1927 Gizela Weyde and Otto
Benesch introduced the painting
St John the Baptist, St Barbara
and Two Donors (oak, 90×75 cm)
into relevant art historical
literature. This painting was a
donation from Countess
Maldeghem-Bethlen in the late
nineteenth century to the chapel of
St Mary in Bratislava (Pressburg,
Poszony). It has been recognized
that the panel in its present form
is a junction of two former altar
wings with arched tops (each of
90×28cm) and the additional central
panel (90×19cm) of different
pictorial quality. Both scholars
devoted their attention primarily
to the adapted altar wings. In a
joint work with Gizela Weyde, Otto
Benesch supported an attribution to
Hugo van der Goes and Colyn de
Coter (G. Weyde, O. Benesch, 1928).
He believed that while the panel
with St Barbara was the work of
Colyn de Coter the panel with St
John the Baptist and the Donor
might have been started by Hugo van
der Goes and later completed by
Colyn de Coter. Maquet-Tombu was
inclined to consider both side
panels as the workshop Colyn de
Coter (J. Maquet-Tombu, 1937) C.
Périer-d’Ieteren attributed the
painting to Colyn de Coter and
claimed it an early Coter work from
around 1500 (C. Périer-d’Ieteren,
1981, 1982, 1985). M.
Comblen-Sonkes and Jarmila Vacková
agreed and claimed it an authentic
work of Colyn de Coter (J. Vacková
- M. Comblen-Sonkes, 1985,
including a detailed analysis of
earlier literature; also J.
Vacková, 1985, 1989).
Despite scholarly discussions of
attribution, no serious attention
has been paid to the central part
of the painting and to the
pictorial concept of the whole
panel in its present form. The
painting shows two kneeling donors
in the foreground. While praying,
they are turned towards the
crucifix standing on a marble
plinth of an unidentifiable
architecture (an altar?).There are
no indications of the identity of
the donors, who were presumably man
and wife and who were probably
named after their patron saints.
The saints presenting the donors
are shown behind the kneeling
couple. Behind the man is St John
the Baptist, holding the Lamb of
God and behind the woman stands St
Barbara with a leaf and a tower.
The background of the panel is
completed by a dramatically
rendered sky with clouds.
While both side panels can be
considered, at a first glance, as
fine examples of Netherlandish
devotional art of around 1500 the
central part of the painting
recalls another ideological
concept. What we see here is no
longer the biblical scene of the
Crucifixion, as depicted in many
Netherlandish paintings, but
portrays the office of prayer. The
typical naturalistic landscape with
Jerusalem is missing, and the
terrestrial world is replaced by
that of an unearthly one. In
conformity to the doctrine of the
Reformation the crucifix at the
center of the pictorial composition
serves as a visible sign of the
message proclaimed by the word in
the sermon.
It seems to be highly probable
that the man who commissioned the
painting and agreed to have the older
altar wings reused may have been an
ancestor of the couple whose
portraits are depicted on the panels.
Indubitably, he wished to keep them
present in general memory. However,
in the new ideological context of the
Reformation he decided
retrospectively to change the
devotional context of the
worshippers. By agreeing to
incorporate the older panels with the
portraits of his ancestors into the
new pictorial composition, he
radically modified their former
devotional function. From this point
of view the Bratislava panel in its
present arrangement offers insight
into practises used during the era of
religious reform.
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