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拍品专文
Surprisingly little is known about the life of Herri met de Bles. He is generally identified as the ‘Herry de Patinir’ who was registered as a master of the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke in 1535, and who may have been the nephew of Joachim Patinir. Unquestionably, these two artists were at the forefront of the newly-emerging genre of landscape painting in the Southern Netherlands, and following Joachim Patinir’s death in 1524, Herri became the genre’s leading and most prolific practitioner. While the two painters worked in similar styles, Herri met de Bles eschewed Patinir’s structured, planar compositions in favor of more chaotic, spectacular constructions. Herri’s mountains rise more naturally from the plains below and his background landscapes are much more atmospheric; subtle cool blues and blue-whites often veil the distant prospect, contrasting with the warm greens of the foliage in the foreground. Herri’s mountains are usually painted in soft tones ranging from pinks to brownish purples, while his pictures teem with the myriad details of life.
The present panoramic landscape portrays a subject that Herri met de Bles treated on several occasions: Saint John the Evangelist's vision of the Apocalypse. Accompanied by his attribute the eagle, the young apostle sits on the shore of the island of Patmos looking toward the tumultuous sky, his arm raised to the heavens (Revelation 1:9). On his lap rests his Book of Revelation, which brings a close to the New Testament and describes his Apocalyptic visions of the struggle between Good and Evil culminating in Armageddon, which here takes the form of a fierce naval battle. In the clouds above, ‘a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns’ (Revelation 12:3) approaches a ‘woman clothed with the sun, and the moon’ wearing ‘a crown of twelve stars’ (Revelation 12:1). These two figures are frequently interpreted as Satan and the Virgin Mary, respectively. The woman and dragon appear in a related painting, formerly given to Herri met de Bles by Max J. Friedländer but now attributed to an anonymous South-Netherlandish artist from the first quarter of the sixteenth century (M.J. Friedländer, Early Netherlandish Painting, XIII, Antonis Mor and his Contemporaries, H. Pauwels and G. Lemmens with M. Gierts, eds., Leiden, 1975, pl. 42, no. 84), is in the Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp. The shores in the foreground are littered with shells and coral branches, reflecting the third of the living creatures who will die at the sounding of the second trumpet (Revelation 8:9). The two cities, visible on either side of the estuary that divides the painting, have been read by Luc Serck as representations of Babylon (on the left; Revelation 18:16-17) and the New Jerusalem (the walled city with 12 doors on the right; Revelation 21:9-14 and 22; op. cit., pp. 860-861).
In this painting Herri met de Bles wove together several compositional motifs, each drawn from other paintings from his oeuvre, distinguishing it from the majority of his known artistic output (L. Serck, op. cit., p. 861). As Serck noted, these quotations may be identified as follows: the estuary appears in Galleys and warships in an estuary (Musée de l’Art wallon, Liège); some of the ships appear in The Calling of Saint Peter (Galleria Borghese, Rome) and Landscape with the Preaching of Saint John the Baptist (Cleveland Museum of Art); the New Jerusalem is drawn from The Calling of Saint Peter (Museo Civico, Padua), among others. The use of these models might indicate, as Serck tentatively suggests, that the artist was relying on drawings that were kept in his workshop. Remarkably, the three most prominent, large black birds in the foreground are quotations from Raphael’s Miraculous Draft of Fishes (ibid., fig. 1), part of the magnificent tapestry cycle commissioned by Pope Leo X for the Sistine Chapel. Herri met de Bles might have known them from Raphael’s cartoon of around 1515-16, which had been sent to Brussels for weaving. Though the precise early history of Raphael’s cartoons is unclear prior to their rediscovery in Genoa at the beginning of the seventeenth century, they are presumed to have remained in the Brussels workshop of Pieter Coecke van Aelst, and it is there that met de Bles may have had the opportunity to study them in person.
In a recent article, Serck also identified the building at upper left, on the highest mountain as a representation of the château de Montaigle before its destruction in 1554, rendered with meticulous attention to detail (loc. cit.). This fourteenth-century castle was built in the province of Namur, today part of the commune of Falaën, likely the region of the artist’s birth. Early on in its history, the structure was incorporated into the area’s defensive system, and functioned in that capacity until it was destroyed by the duc de Nevers, under the direction of Henry II of France. From left to right, here we see the keep, the crenelated watchtower and main tower, and the rest of the castle and garrison behind the wall, all of which may be compared to the surviving ruins (fig. 2). Bles must have felt some connection to this structure, which he would have known from his youth, as he included it other paintings, including his Landscape with Christ on the Road to Calvary (fig. 3; Gemäldegalerie der Akademie der bildenden Künste, Vienna). The scholar further identified, albeit tentatively, the ruined castle set on the mountain below the château de Montaigle as the château de Crèvecoeur, which was part of the defenses of the city of Bouvignes (ibid.).
Amongst the myriad birds who populate the shoreline in the foreground may also be seen, peeking out from a small cave, an owl. From the sixteenth century onward, this bird has always been taken as the 'hallmark' or signature of works by Herri met de Bles. Gian Paolo Lomazzo (Trattato dell'arte de la Pittura..., Milan, 1584, pp. 475 and 689) refers to the painter as 'Henerico Blessio Boemo, Chiamato de la Civetta [little owl] principal pittore de paesi', while Karel van Mander (Het Schilder-boeck, Haarlem, 1604, fol. 219v) calls him 'Den Meester van den uil' (the master of the owl), adding 'His works can often be found with the Emperor, in Italy and in other places; in Italy they are particularly sought after, for the man with the little owl is very widely famed'.
The present panoramic landscape portrays a subject that Herri met de Bles treated on several occasions: Saint John the Evangelist's vision of the Apocalypse. Accompanied by his attribute the eagle, the young apostle sits on the shore of the island of Patmos looking toward the tumultuous sky, his arm raised to the heavens (Revelation 1:9). On his lap rests his Book of Revelation, which brings a close to the New Testament and describes his Apocalyptic visions of the struggle between Good and Evil culminating in Armageddon, which here takes the form of a fierce naval battle. In the clouds above, ‘a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns’ (Revelation 12:3) approaches a ‘woman clothed with the sun, and the moon’ wearing ‘a crown of twelve stars’ (Revelation 12:1). These two figures are frequently interpreted as Satan and the Virgin Mary, respectively. The woman and dragon appear in a related painting, formerly given to Herri met de Bles by Max J. Friedländer but now attributed to an anonymous South-Netherlandish artist from the first quarter of the sixteenth century (M.J. Friedländer, Early Netherlandish Painting, XIII, Antonis Mor and his Contemporaries, H. Pauwels and G. Lemmens with M. Gierts, eds., Leiden, 1975, pl. 42, no. 84), is in the Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp. The shores in the foreground are littered with shells and coral branches, reflecting the third of the living creatures who will die at the sounding of the second trumpet (Revelation 8:9). The two cities, visible on either side of the estuary that divides the painting, have been read by Luc Serck as representations of Babylon (on the left; Revelation 18:16-17) and the New Jerusalem (the walled city with 12 doors on the right; Revelation 21:9-14 and 22; op. cit., pp. 860-861).
In this painting Herri met de Bles wove together several compositional motifs, each drawn from other paintings from his oeuvre, distinguishing it from the majority of his known artistic output (L. Serck, op. cit., p. 861). As Serck noted, these quotations may be identified as follows: the estuary appears in Galleys and warships in an estuary (Musée de l’Art wallon, Liège); some of the ships appear in The Calling of Saint Peter (Galleria Borghese, Rome) and Landscape with the Preaching of Saint John the Baptist (Cleveland Museum of Art); the New Jerusalem is drawn from The Calling of Saint Peter (Museo Civico, Padua), among others. The use of these models might indicate, as Serck tentatively suggests, that the artist was relying on drawings that were kept in his workshop. Remarkably, the three most prominent, large black birds in the foreground are quotations from Raphael’s Miraculous Draft of Fishes (ibid., fig. 1), part of the magnificent tapestry cycle commissioned by Pope Leo X for the Sistine Chapel. Herri met de Bles might have known them from Raphael’s cartoon of around 1515-16, which had been sent to Brussels for weaving. Though the precise early history of Raphael’s cartoons is unclear prior to their rediscovery in Genoa at the beginning of the seventeenth century, they are presumed to have remained in the Brussels workshop of Pieter Coecke van Aelst, and it is there that met de Bles may have had the opportunity to study them in person.
In a recent article, Serck also identified the building at upper left, on the highest mountain as a representation of the château de Montaigle before its destruction in 1554, rendered with meticulous attention to detail (loc. cit.). This fourteenth-century castle was built in the province of Namur, today part of the commune of Falaën, likely the region of the artist’s birth. Early on in its history, the structure was incorporated into the area’s defensive system, and functioned in that capacity until it was destroyed by the duc de Nevers, under the direction of Henry II of France. From left to right, here we see the keep, the crenelated watchtower and main tower, and the rest of the castle and garrison behind the wall, all of which may be compared to the surviving ruins (fig. 2). Bles must have felt some connection to this structure, which he would have known from his youth, as he included it other paintings, including his Landscape with Christ on the Road to Calvary (fig. 3; Gemäldegalerie der Akademie der bildenden Künste, Vienna). The scholar further identified, albeit tentatively, the ruined castle set on the mountain below the château de Montaigle as the château de Crèvecoeur, which was part of the defenses of the city of Bouvignes (ibid.).
Amongst the myriad birds who populate the shoreline in the foreground may also be seen, peeking out from a small cave, an owl. From the sixteenth century onward, this bird has always been taken as the 'hallmark' or signature of works by Herri met de Bles. Gian Paolo Lomazzo (Trattato dell'arte de la Pittura..., Milan, 1584, pp. 475 and 689) refers to the painter as 'Henerico Blessio Boemo, Chiamato de la Civetta [little owl] principal pittore de paesi', while Karel van Mander (Het Schilder-boeck, Haarlem, 1604, fol. 219v) calls him 'Den Meester van den uil' (the master of the owl), adding 'His works can often be found with the Emperor, in Italy and in other places; in Italy they are particularly sought after, for the man with the little owl is very widely famed'.