Enguerrand Quarton - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Enguerrand Quarton (c. 1410 – c. 1466) was a French painter and manuscript illuminator

Illuminated manuscript

An illuminated manuscript is a manuscript in which the text is supplemented by the addition of decoration, such as decorated initials, borders and miniature illustrations...

whose few surviving works are among the first masterpieces of a distinctively French style, very different from either Italian or Early Netherlandish painting

Early Netherlandish painting

Early Netherlandish painting refers to the work of artists active in the Low Countries during the 15th- and early 16th-century Northern renaissance, especially in the flourishing Burgundian cities of Bruges and Ghent...

. Six paintings by him are documented, of which only two survive, and in addition the Louvre

Louvre

The Musée du Louvre – in English, the Louvre Museum or simply the Louvre – is one of the world's largest museums, the most visited art museum in the world and a historic monument. A central landmark of Paris, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the 1st arrondissement...

now follows most art historians in giving him the famous Avignon Pietà. His two documented works are the remarkable Coronation of the Virgin (1453–54, Villeneuve-les-Avignon) and The Virgin of Mercy (1452, Musée Condé, Chantilly

Château de Chantilly

The Château de Chantilly is a historic château located in the town of Chantilly, France. It comprises two attached buildings; the Grand Château, destroyed during the French Revolution and rebuilt in the 1870s, and the Petit Château which was built around 1560 for Anne de Montmorency...

). Two smaller altarpiece

Altarpiece

An altarpiece is a picture or relief representing a religious subject and suspended in a frame behind the altar of a church. The altarpiece is often made up of two or more separate panels created using a technique known as panel painting. It is then called a diptych, triptych or polyptych for two,...

s are also attributed to him.

Life and career

Quarton was born in the diocese of Laon

Laon

Laon is the capital city of the Aisne department in Picardy in northern France.-History:The hilly district of Laon, which rises a hundred metres above the otherwise flat Picardy plain, has always held strategic importance...

in northern France, but moved to Provence

Provence

Provence ; Provençal: Provença in classical norm or Prouvènço in Mistralian norm) is a region of south eastern France on the Mediterranean adjacent to Italy. It is part of the administrative région of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur...

in 1444, possibly after working in the Netherlands. There he worked in Aix-en-Provence

Aix-en-Provence

Aix , or Aix-en-Provence to distinguish it from other cities built over hot springs, is a city-commune in southern France, some north of Marseille. It is in the region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, in the département of Bouches-du-Rhône, of which it is a subprefecture. The population of Aix is...

, Arles

Arles

Arles is a city and commune in the south of France, in the Bouches-du-Rhône department, of which it is a subprefecture, in the former province of Provence....

in 1446, and Avignon

Avignon

Avignon is a French commune in southeastern France in the départment of the Vaucluse bordered by the left bank of the Rhône river. Of the 94,787 inhabitants of the city on 1 January 2010, 12 000 live in the ancient town centre surrounded by its medieval ramparts.Often referred to as the...

, where he was based from 1447 until his death there in about 1466. Provence at this time had some of the most impressive painters in France, to judge by surviving work at any rate, with Nicholas Froment and Barthélemy d'Eyck

Barthélemy d'Eyck

Barthélemy d'Eyck, van Eyck or d' Eyck , was an Early Netherlandish artist who worked in France and probably in Burgundy as a painter and manuscript illuminator...

, who both appear to have collaborated with Quarton; the North had Jean Fouquet

Jean Fouquet

Jean Fouquet was a preeminent French painter of the 15th century, a master of both panel painting and manuscript illumination, and the apparent inventor of the portrait miniature. He was the first French artist to travel to Italy and experience at first hand the Italian Early...

however. All were influenced by both Italy and the Netherlands to varying degrees. The Pope

Pope

The Pope is the Bishop of Rome, a position that makes him the leader of the worldwide Catholic Church . In the Catholic Church, the Pope is regarded as the successor of Saint Peter, the Apostle...

s and Anti-Popes were no longer living in Avignon, but it remained Papal territory, and the city contained many Italian merchants.

Except for some banners, no works by Quarton for René of Anjou, the ruler of most of Provence, are documented, although René was a keen patron of the arts who employed D'Eyck for many years and patronised several other artists. Many of Quarton's clients were important figures in René's court and administration, like the Chancellor of Provence who commissioned the Missal of Jean des Martins (BnF, Ms nouv. aq. latin. 2661).

Although the influence of Quarton can be seen strongly in subsequent Provençal painting, and also in some works as far away as Germany and Italy, he was later almost wholly forgotten until the Coronation of the Virgin was exhibited in Paris in 1900, since when both awareness of his importance, and the number of works attributed to him, has steadily increased. The attribution to him of the Avignon Pietà has only been generally accepted since about the 1960s.

The Virgin of Mercy

This work, also known as the Cadard Altarpiece after the donor, uses a motif that is most often found in Italian art, and was developed by Simone Martini

Simone Martini

Simone Martini was an Italian painter born in Siena.He was a major figure in the development of early Italian painting and greatly influenced the development of the International Gothic style....

a century earlier. The painting has the same plain gold background as the Avignon Pietà, which by this date was unusual, although it also appears in what is now the best-known version of this theme, completed just a few years earlier by Piero della Francesca

Piero della Francesca

Piero della Francesca was a painter of the Early Renaissance. As testified by Giorgio Vasari in his Lives of the Artists, to contemporaries he was also known as a mathematician and geometer. Nowadays Piero della Francesca is chiefly appreciated for his art. His painting was characterized by its...

. The scale of the figures is hieratic; The Virgin and Saint John the Baptist and Saint John the Evangelist tower over the donor and his wife, who are themselves slightly larger than the faithful sheltered by the Virgin's robe. The contract of February 1452 specifies that both Quarton and Pierre Villate will work on the piece, but art historians have struggled to detect two hands in the works as it exists, although Dominique Thiébaut suggests some of the sheltering figures are weaker than the rest of the work, and by Villate. One possibility is that Villate was responsible for a predella

Predella

A predella is the platform or step on which an altar stands . In painting, the predella is the painting or sculpture along the frame at the bottom of an altarpiece...

now lost.

A recently discovered document of 1466 orders some painted or stained glass

Stained glass

The term stained glass can refer to coloured glass as a material or to works produced from it. Throughout its thousand-year history, the term has been applied almost exclusively to the windows of churches and other significant buildings...

for the Town Hall of Arles from a "maître Enguibran" living in Avignon. He may have had help from Pierre Villate, who is documented as fulfilling many commissions for glass, and was also a party to the contract for the Virgin of Mercy. Hardly any work certainly his survives, but it is clear he had a considerable reputation in his day. He was younger than Quarton, but already a master of the Guild in 1452.

The Coronation of the Virgin

The contract for the Coronation specifies the unusual representation of the Father

God the Father

God the Father is a gendered title given to God in many monotheistic religions, particularly patriarchal, Abrahamic ones. In Judaism, God is called Father because he is the creator, life-giver, law-giver, and protector...

and Son of the Holy Trinity as identical figures (very rare in the 15th century, though there are other examples), but allows Quarton to represent the Virgin as he chooses. Around the Trinity, blue and red angel

Angel

Angels are mythical beings often depicted as messengers of God in the Hebrew and Christian Bibles along with the Quran. The English word angel is derived from the Greek ἄγγελος, a translation of in the Hebrew Bible ; a similar term, ملائكة , is used in the Qur'an...

s are deployed similar to those in Fouquet's Melun diptych (now Antwerp :Image:Fouquet Madonna.jpg). The depiction of Rome (left) and Jerusalem (right) in the panoramic landscape below is also specified in the contract; the donor had been on a pilgrimage

Pilgrimage

A pilgrimage is a journey or search of great moral or spiritual significance. Typically, it is a journey to a shrine or other location of importance to a person's beliefs and faith...

that included both cities. Beneath this Purgatory

Purgatory

Purgatory is the condition or process of purification or temporary punishment in which, it is believed, the souls of those who die in a state of grace are made ready for Heaven...

(left) and Hell

Hell

In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...

(right) open up, and in the centre the donor kneels before a Crucifixion

Crucifixion

Crucifixion is an ancient method of painful execution in which the condemned person is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross and left to hang until dead...

. On the extreme left a church is shown in "cut-away" style, containing a Mass of Saint Gregory

Mass of Saint Gregory

The Mass of Saint Gregory is a subject in Roman Catholic art which first appears in the late Middle Ages and was still found in the Counter-Reformation. Pope Gregory I The Mass of Saint Gregory is a subject in Roman Catholic art which first appears in the late Middle Ages and was still found in...

. Quarton was given seventeen months from the contract date to deliver the painting by September 29, 1454. As is usual, materials were carefully specified; elements of the language used appear to come from the dialect of Quarton's native Picardy

Picardy

This article is about the historical French province. For other uses, see Picardy .Picardy is a historical province of France, in the north of France...

, suggesting much of the final draft was by him. The contract has been described as "the most detailed to survive for medieval European painting".

Like many of Quarton's landscape backgrounds, this depicts the Provençal landscape in a style derived from Italian painting, whilst his figures are more influenced by Netherlandish artists like Robert Campin

Robert Campin

Robert Campin , now usually identified as the artist known as the Master of Flémalle, is usually considered the first great master of Early Netherlandish painting...

and Jan van Eyck

Jan van Eyck

Jan van Eyck was a Flemish painter active in Bruges and considered one of the best Northern European painters of the 15th century....

, but with a severity and elegance that is French alone, as is the geometrical boldness of his composition. His very strong colours have little shading, and his lighting is "harsh, even merciless". The landscape includes perhaps the first appearance in art of Mont Sainte-Victoire, later to be painted so often by Cézanne and others. The painting remains in the monastery

Monastery

Monastery denotes the building, or complex of buildings, that houses a room reserved for prayer as well as the domestic quarters and workplace of monastics, whether monks or nuns, and whether living in community or alone .Monasteries may vary greatly in size – a small dwelling accommodating only...

Chartreuse du Val de Bénédiction, Villeneuve-lès-Avignon

Villeneuve-lès-Avignon

Villeneuve-lès-Avignon is a commune in the Gard department in southern France. It can also be spelled Villeneuve-lez-Avignon.-Population:-Sights:* Chartreuse Notre-Dame-du-val-de-Bénédiction* Fort Saint-André* Tour Philippe Le Bel...

, for which it was commissioned by a local clergyman, Jean de Montagny.

The Pietà of Villeneuve-lès-Avignon

The Pietà

Pietà

The Pietà is a subject in Christian art depicting the Virgin Mary cradling the dead body of Jesus, most often found in sculpture. As such, it is a particular form of the Lamentation of Christ, a scene from the Passion of Christ found in cycles of the Life of Christ...

, where the dead Christ is supported by his grieving mother, is one of the most common themes of late-medieval religious art, but this is one of the most striking depictions, "perhaps the greatest masterpiece produced in France in the 15th century." The curved back form of Christ's body is highly original, and the stark, motionless dignity of the other figures is very different from Italian or Netherlandish depictions. Before the painting was generally attributed to Quarton, some art historians thought the painting might be by a Catalan or Portuguese master. The bare background landscape falls away to a horizon broken by the buildings of Jerusalem, but instead of a sky there is plain gold leaf with stamped and incised haloes

Halo (religious iconography)

A halo is a ring of light that surrounds a person in art. They have been used in the iconography of many religions to indicate holy or sacred figures, and have at various periods also been used in images of rulers or heroes...

, borders and inscriptions. The clerical donor, portrayed with Netherlandish realism, kneels to the left. The painting came from Villeneuve-lès-Avignon

Villeneuve-lès-Avignon

, just across the Rhône

Rhône River

The Rhone is one of the major rivers of Europe, rising in Switzerland and running from there through southeastern France. At Arles, near its mouth on the Mediterranean Sea, the river divides into two branches, known as the Great Rhone and the Little Rhone...

from Avignon, and is sometimes known as the "Villeneuve Pietà".

Other attributions

Some other attributions have been proposed by Luc Ta-Van-Thinh (2002):

"Pierre de Luxembourg seeing the Christ crucified", painting on wood (musée du Petit Palais d'Avignon)
"Saint Siffrein", painting on wood (musée du Petit Palais d'Avignon)
"The Coronation of the Virgin, between Saint Siffrein and Saint Michael", triptych on wood (old cathedral of Saint-Siffrein of Carpentras
Carpentras
Carpentras is a commune in the Vaucluse department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in southeastern France.It stands on the banks of the Auzon...

)
"Saint Siffrein between saint Michael and saint Catherine of Alexandria", glass in the old cathedral of Saint-Siffrein of Carpentras

Illuminated manuscripts

A number of miniatures

Miniature (illuminated manuscript)

The word miniature, derived from the Latin minium, red lead, is a picture in an ancient or medieval illuminated manuscript; the simple decoration of the early codices having been miniated or delineated with that pigment...

in illuminated manuscripts have been ascribed to Quarton, whose style has many distinctive features, in colouring, modelling and iconography

Iconography

Iconography is the branch of art history which studies the identification, description, and the interpretation of the content of images. The word iconography literally means "image writing", and comes from the Greek "image" and "to write". A secondary meaning is the painting of icons in the...

. François Avril of the BnF

BNF

BNF may stand for:In science:*Biological nitrogen fixation, a process that converts nitrogen in the atmosphere to ammonia*British National Formulary, the standard drug reference manual**British National Formulary for Children...

has been a significant figure in these attributions, the first of which was made in 1977. In 1444 a document relating to Quarton was witnessed by him and Barthélemy d'Eyck in Aix, and from around this period dates an unfinished Book of Hours

Book of Hours

The book of hours was a devotional book popular in the later Middle Ages. It is the most common type of surviving medieval illuminated manuscript. Like every manuscript, each manuscript book of hours is unique in one way or another, but most contain a similar collection of texts, prayers and...

in the Morgan Library

Morgan Library

The Morgan Library & Museum is a museum and research library in New York City, USA. It was founded to house the private library of J. P. Morgan in 1906, which included, besides the manuscripts and printed books, some of them in rare bindings, his collection of prints and drawings...

, on which they worked closely together, with some miniatures apparently drawn by d'Eyck and painted by Quarton, who also did others all by himself. Another Book of Hours, in the Huntington Library is rather later, but variable in quality. A large and sumptuous missal

Missal

A missal is a liturgical book containing all instructions and texts necessary for the celebration of Mass throughout the year.-History:Before the compilation of such books, several books were used when celebrating Mass...

in the BnF, dated 1466, with two full-page miniatures, three smaller, and many historiated initial

Historiated initial

A historiated initial is an enlarged letter at the beginning of a paragraph or other section of text, which contains a picture. Strictly speaking, an inhabited initial contains figures that are decorative only, without forming a subject, whereas in a historiated initial there is an identifiable...

s, shows Quarton's fully developed style, as do two large miniatures added to the famous earlier Boucicaut Book of Hours
Hours of Jean de Boucicaut
The Hours of Jean de Boucicaut is an illuminated book of Hours produced around 1405-08 for Jean de Boucicaut. It contains the Paris liturgy of the Hours and founded a typical Parisian style of illumination that was continued by artists for the whole first half of the 15th century. It contains 44...

by Quarton, probably in the 1460s. Some miniatures of quality from a further Hours in Namur complete those currently attributed to him.

External links

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