An Inside Look at Netherlandish Diptychs
December 2, 2006
2:00 p.m.–5:00 p.m.
East Building Auditorium
Held in conjunction with the exhibition
Prayers and Portraits: Unfolding the Netherlandish Diptych
Slide lectures by noted scholars Victor M. Schmidt, Carol J. Purtle, and Al Acres.
Netherlandish Diptychs: Forerunners and Precedents
Victor M. Schmidt, Department of Art and Architectural History, University of Groningen
The Prayers and Portraits: Unfolding the Netherlandish Diptych exhibition at the National Gallery of Art focuses on a particular kind of Netherlandish diptych: the half-length devotional diptych, combining a sacred image (usually of the Virgin and Child) with the portrait of a supplicant. This lecture will survey the main characteristics of diptychs in European panel painting before 1400, considering the extent to which Netherlandish diptychs have forerunners and precedents. Special attention will be paid to the iconography of diptychs, the decorated reverses, the role of heraldry, and the images of supplicants. Presenting what is known about the function and use of diptychs, this lecture provides some context for the Netherlandish diptychs in the exhibition.
Unfolding the Devotional Diptych: Visions and Re-visions
Carol J. Purtle, Benjamin W. Rawlins Professor of Art History, University of Memphis
The current exhibition places important emphasis on the format of the diptych as a particular type of object commissioned by patrons over the course of several centuries. This lecture will consider the origins of the devotional image and the "true icon" while approaching the historic and timely conditions that governed the use of images in prayer. The validation of prayer by word and vision will be examined along with the tradition of devotional imaging established in Byzantium and popularized later in Western Europe. The specific features of several diptychs in the Prayers and Portraits: Unfolding the Netherlandish Diptych exhibition will be discussed in detail.
The Middle of Diptychs
Alfred Acres, Department of Art, Music, and Theater, Georgetown University
Prayers and Portraits: Unfolding the Netherlandish Diptych invites attention to more than the extraordinary works it brings together; here we also have a rare opportunity to ponder a distinct mechanism of pictorial thought. As an ancient format, the diptych is familiar enough to be taken almost for granted. What could be simpler, after all, than the lateral pairing of images? An observer reflexively grasps that they are to be understood as intimately related. Far less clear, however, is the precise nature of the relationship proposed in each case.
While many of the diptychs in the exhibition pair one or more individuals with sacred figures to whom they pray, others create different kinds of conjunctions—between sacred figures, between narrative scenes, between spouses, and more. This talk will address the dimension of betweenness they share. Given the variety of subject matter among them, as well as among the long lineage of diptychs that preceded them, it would be a mistake to assume the persistence of a stable interpretive dynamic. The durability of the diptych speaks, in fact, to its adaptability for a range of contexts and motives. At the same time, that durability suggests something almost elementally useful about the form—and in ways beyond the relative portability of a foldable painting.
What can be accomplished by making two things equally separate and inseparable? A close look at variable internal relationships among a selection of diptychs reveals specific habits of perception and interpretation they engage and, in some cases, challenge. Faced with images locked in mutual balance, an observer finds his or her attention divided by design. We are placed in a middle that demands unusual kinds of thought.