History of Western Art 1: Gothic Art (16 of 23)

History of Western Art

There is also an attempt to spatial recession, by the use of plain surfaces of path or river perhaps the castle wall shown on the diagonal, also very often certainly the one that depicts the month of October is shown by what we would call focal perspective where the walls are reced'g where at an angle from the viewer in that sense they represent and show some of the newer art.
But of course it is not the same as that, that is being practised in italy or would be practised in italy in the early part of the Fifteenth century because there in no unified perspective system.
Again the eye is still allowed to wander over the richness of the motifs and colours instead of being focussed on one principle subject or one principle point it the composition.
And although the ideas of the italian masters began to spread throughout Europe, the art of the Netherlands retained its own individual identity, with its greatest master undoubtedly Jan van Eyck.
Like many artists of his age, little is known of the early life of Van Eyck, and even less of his brother Hubert, who is believed to have been involved with the creation of some of his early work.

By 1425, however, we know that he was established in Lille as court painter to Philip The Good, Duke of Burgundy, a relationship that would make Jan Van Eyck a wealthy man.
By 1432, he had completed what many consider to be his greatest work, an altarpiece for the cathedral of St Bavo in Ghent, which Hubert almost certainly helped to create.
As with the earlier work of the Limbourg brothers, the new system of perspective is absent And yet the Ghent Altarpiece achieves an impression of three-dimensions with its immaculate detail and total contrasts, both in the individual figures and the landscape, to create an effect quite unlike any contemporary work in italy.
And another innovative aspect of the Ghent Altarpiece is the material, which Van Eyck chose to execute the work.