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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion (closed) ca. 1532-35 carved and gilded wood, tempera paintings on panels Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion (open) ca. 1532-35 carved and gilded wood, tempera paintings on panels Philadelphia Museum of Art |
This elaborate altarpiece depicts scenes from life of Christ. On either side of the Crucifixion in the center are carvings of scenes from the Passion, with insets of earlier events prefiguring Jesus' suffering. On the base, or predella, paintings emphasize the idea of communion: a scene from the Last Supper flanked by two related Old Testament subjects (the meeting of Abraham and Melchizedek, and the Gathering of Manna). A total of nineteen tempera paintings on wooden panels, executed by unknown workshop artists, echo the then enormously influential style of Pieter Coecke van Aelst (1502-1550). The work was acquired for the high altar of the chapel at the château of Pagny in northern France during the redecoration projects of Admiral Chabot and the Cardinal of Givry in the 1530s. Such altarpieces were a specialty of Antwerp craftsmen, who produced them for a widespread European market. Surprisingly, such elaborate and impressive works were not exorbitantly expensive, partly because they were made from prefabricated components and treated standardized themes. This example belongs to a group by an anonymous artist sometimes called the Master of the Oplinter Altar. While distinct from the Italianate and local styles found in other works at Pagny, the altarpiece, with its detailed, fully modeled, gilded figures, follows a taste for Northern art that was well established in Burgundy, which had historic links to the southern Netherlands.
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| Choir-Screen from the Chapel of the Château of Pagny ca. 1536-38 marble and alabaster Philadelphia Museum of Art |
This screen, the central interior element of the chapel of the château of Pagny, is one of the finest structures surviving from the French Renaissance. The coats of arms over the central archway are those of Cardinal Claude de Givry, Archbishop of Langres; Philippe Chabot, admiral of France and governor of Burgundy; and Françoise de Longvy, wife of Chabot, niece of Givry, and the heiress of Pagny. While Chabot owned the château, the archbishop played a role in the decoration of the chapel The statues that stand above at left and right are probably St. Claude and St. Philip. At center are the Virgin Mary and St. John. Originally a stone sculpture of Christ on the cross stood on the column capital at the top of the arch. As installed at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the carved and painted Flemish altarpiece from Pagny is visible through the screen, positioned roughly where it would have stood in the 1530s in the chapel, though it would then have been elevated on an altar.
– based on curator's notes from the Philadelphia Museum of Art
Below, the nineteen separate panel-paintings decorating the outside and inside of the altarpiece. They are presented (outside first) from left to right and top to bottom. Those that have spent the past five centuries on the outside of the altarpiece (when closed, as it would have been most of the time) are considerably more worn in appearance than those from the more protected and less frequently exposed inside.
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Temptation of Christ ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Christ and the Samaritan Woman ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Baptism of Christ ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Raising of Lazarus ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Christ healing the Blind Man ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion The Transfiguration ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Meeting of Abraham and Melchizedek ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Last Supper ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Gathering of Manna ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Agony in the Garden ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Noli me tangere ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Betrayal of Christ ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Christ before Pilate ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion The Entombment ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion The Resurrection ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion The Annunciation ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion The Visitation ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Massacre of the Innocents ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |
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| Altarpiece with Scenes of the Passion Rest on the Flight into Egypt ca. 1532-35 tempera on panel Philadelphia Museum of Art |