St Eligius in His Workshop
Netherlandish Northern Renaissance Painter, ca.1410-1473 1449 Oil on wood, 98 x 85 cm Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York St Eligius, who was born c. 590 in Limousin, notably in the making of reliquaries has become one of the most popular saints of the Christian West. Ancient tradition credits him with extraordinary talent as a goldsmith. St Eligius in His Workshop remains to this day the best-known and best-loved painting of Petrus Christus. It shows two young fiances who have brought the patron saint of goldsmiths a quantity of precious metal to be melted down and fashioned into rings as token of their love. Christus gives us an extremely detailed representation of the goldsmith's shop. Not only are there all the instruments of the trade, but also many liturgical objects, carefully arranged on shelves. There is also a convex circular mirror on the right-hand side of St Eligius's table, in an obvious allusion to the Arnolfini Marriage by Jan van Eyk. In it we can see the reflection of a square, with a couple of passers-by. Although the presence of the saint gives the work a religious dimension, this remains essentially a genre painting: that is, a representation of secular and commercial activities, a scene from everyday life. , Artist: CHRISTUS, Petrus , St Eligius in His Workshop , 1451-1500 , Flemish , painting , religious
Painting ID:: 63972
Petrus Christus Flemish 1415-1473
Petrus Christus Locations
South Netherlandish painter.
His known artistic career began in Bruges on 6 July 1444 when, as the Poorterboek (citizens register) for that day reveals, he purchased his citizenship ... in order to be a painter. Town records show that he and his wife became members of the Confraternity of the Dry Tree c. 1462; that in 1463 he and another painter, Pieter Nachtegale, were paid for the construction of a Tree of Jesse (destr.) and for the cost of assistants employed on the day of the religious procession in which it was used; and that on 19 March 1472 he served as a representative of the painters guild in a dispute with another painter, Jehan de Hervy the elder ( fl 1472-1507). These and a few other scattered references comprise the existing documentation for Christusa life and work. St Eligius in His Workshop 1449(1449)
Medium oil on panel
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