Hans Memling Life and Work

MC_01
detail groter inscannen
Till-Holger Borchert
fig.2
Memling
St Ursula Casket, detail
Bruges, Stedelijke Musea,
Memlingmuseum
Sint-Janshospitaal
fig.1
Memling
Portrait of a Man with a Coin of the
Emperor Nero (Bernardo Bembo?)
[cat.10], detail of pl.11
Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum voor
Schone Kunsten
Memling Life and Work
In addition to being one of the key painters of fifteenthcentury Bruges alongside Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus
and Gerard David Hans Memling has long been numbered among the most important exponents of early Netherlandish art as a whole. With almost a hundred surviving
paintings traditionally ascribed to Memling or his workshop, the scale of his oeuvre lends it a prominent position
among Netherlandish painters before 1500, while also
identifying him as one of the most productive and versatile masters of his era.1
The extant oeuvre allows a relatively firm reconstruction of Memlings activities as a painter there is a series of
works for which we have been able to identify the patron,
while other paintings can be securely dated by means of
inscriptions or other sources. But when it comes to the
artists biography, whole swathes remain entirely obscure.
What information we can glean from contemporary documents referring to Hans Memling does not exactly paint a
detailed picture of the artists life and circumstances. What
is more, those sources are predominantly legal or administrative in character and so focus primarily on property,
money and legal matters. The information they provide is
limited to certain highly specific details of Memlings life,
as is the case with most of the painters active in Flanders in
the period in question. Only through painstaking detective work combining snippets of information from different archives and comparing them with contemporary
sources has it been possible to reach certain conclusions
regarding the reality of Memlings life in Bruges in the latter part of the fifteenth century.2
In addition to the archival material, art-historical texts
from the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
contain some interesting remarks about Memling. Taken
together with the biographical details and the painters
firmly ascribed oeuvre, these enable us to formulate plaus
ible hypotheses regarding the artists career.3
The earliest archive reference to Memling dates from 1465:
on 30 January of that year, the painter paid 24 Flemish shillings equivalent to one months wages for a craftsman
to acquire citizenship of Bruges. Foreigners settling in
the Flemish town had to register as citizens before being
permitted to engage in business or to pursue their profession there. Citizenship could be acquired through marriage, by spending a year and a day in the city or by paying a fee. The fact that Memling opted for the latter tells us
11
two things. Firstly, he had the financial resources to purchase citizenship immediately on arriving in Bruges and
to become professionally active in the prosperous Flemish trading metropolis without delay. It also suggests that
it was as an independent master that Memling arrived in
Bruges early in 1465 and hence that he had already put in
his years as apprentice and journeyman.
We can now safely say that before moving to Bruges,
Memling was employed in Rogier van der Weydens work
shop in Brussels and that he did not seek to set up an atelier of his own until immediately after Rogiers death in
1464. The masterapprentice relationship between the
two painters was cited by Giorgio Vasari and is supported
by clear stylistic parallels including especially in Memlings early works the general character of the underdrawing and the way the painted layers are structured.
Moreover, Memling continued throughout his career to
borrow motifs and compositions from the repertoire of
the Brussels city painter.4 As time went by, however, he
increasingly adapted them, throwing in models from
early Bruges painting Van Eyck and Petrus Christus to
achieve a highly personal style of expression that came to
function as an exemplar for local contemporaries like the
Master of the Legend of St Ursula.
The relevant entry in Bruges Poorterboek (citizens register) for the years 145478 fails to tell us from which town
Memling came to Bruges. It does, however, provide some
important details regarding the painters origins and parentage: the birthplace of Jan van Mimnelinghe is given as the
German town of Seligenstadt, while his fathers name is
recorded as Hamman.5 Seligenstadts Anniversarienbuch lists
two annual commemorations for Memlings parents in
1451 and 1454. Hamman Mommeling and Luca Styrne came
from Kleinkrotzenburg, a village to the north of Seligenstadt and probably succumbed to the plague outbreak
that struck the Middle Rhine and Cologne area in 1450, as
recorded in the Koehlhof sche Chronik.6 Memling had most
likely left his parental home by that time in order to start
his training as an artist; he appears to have been about
thirty years old when he took Bruges citizenship, which
would place his birth not much later than 1435.
Interestingly, there were evidently people in both Bruges
and Seligenstadt who remembered Memlings origins in
subsequent years. Bruges chronicler Rombout de Doppe
res record of the painters death on 11 August 1494 gives
Memlings birthplace as Mainz (oriundus erat Magunciaco),
12
Borchert
fig.3
Memling
Portrait of a Man before a Landscape
Zurich, Kunsthaus, Stiftung Betty
und David M. Koetser
although this probably does not refer to the city itself but to
the territory ruled by the powerful Archdiocese of Mainz,
to which Seligenstadt had belonged since 1309.7 The painters memory also persisted in his native town; four memorial masses for Henn Mommelings, burger zu Pruck in Flandern
(... citizen at Bruges in Flanders) were paid for in 1540/41
and 1543/4 half a century after the artists death.8
While by no means exerting a significant influence on
his work, Memlings Middle Rhenish origins were less
unusual than might appear at first sight. Fifteenth-century
Bruges was an international financial and trading metropolis that attracted many business and tradespeople from
Italy, Spain, France, England and Germany; many of them
settled there semi-permanently. The citizens registers
of the period form an impressive record of the many foreigners who adopted Bruges citizenship each year to enable them to carry out a highly varied range of occupations.
Bruges international character and the relative prosperity
of its inhabitants made it particularly attractive to people
involved in the production of luxury goods; in addition to
panel paintings, these included illuminated manuscripts
and goldsmiths work. There was ample demand in the
city for products of this kind, holding out the promise of a
secure livelihood.
As far as his origins were concerned, therefore, Memling was by no means exceptional among the citys painters. On the contrary, virtually all the artists we think of
today as typical exponents of Bruges painting and whom
we know by name were actually foreigners they did not
come from Bruges or even from the County of Flanders:
Jan van Eyck was born in the Prince-Bishopric of Lige
and had previously worked in Holland before settling in
Bruges in 1432 as court painter to the Duke of Burgundy;
Petrus Christus, who was registered as a Bruges citizen
in 1444, originally came from Baerle in Holland; Gerard
David came to the Flemish city in 1484 from Ouwater
near Haarlem; and Jan Provost, who obtained citizenship
in 1494, was born in the town of Mons in Hainaut and
had previously worked in Valenciennes (in present-day
France). The register of the Bruges corporation to which
panel painters, canvas painters, saddlers, stained-glass
artists and mirror-makers all belonged, includes numerous painters from Germany: Hugo Noben from Aachen,
Jan van Heppendorp and Nikolaas van Keersbeck from
Cologne, Willem van Varwere from Wesel, Konrad de
Valckenaere from Uden and Maarten van Keinsele, whose
birthplace cannot be identified any more specifically.9 All

together, the foreign panel painters who registered with
the Bruges corporation in the fifteenth century accounted
for more than half of the total.10
Memlings own status raises further questions; for one
thing, it is surprising that he never held any official position within the organization during the almost thirty
years that he was active in Bruges: he neither represented
the interests of the craft in court cases, which Petrus
Christus is recorded as doing on several occasions, nor
did he occupy any administrative posts in the board as, for
instance, Gerard David and Jan Provost did.11 It seems
likely that Memling received a sufficient supply of private commissions right from the outset and would thus
not have had to rely on the craft network for public commissions. This view is supported by the fact that, unlike
Christus, David and Provost, Memling never received any
commissions from Bruges civic authorities, despite working for politically influential local families like the Moreels
and Van Nieuwenhoves.12
Another feature of Memlings professional life is even
more striking: although he obtained the required citizenship in 1465, the register of the painters corporation shows
no trace of any initial enrolment on the artists part; this
in spite of the fact that painters had to register with the
craft if they wanted to work in the city. The only exceptions to the rule which also entailed payment of membership dues were artists attached to the court, which
was demonstrably not the case with Memling.13 The most
plausible explanation for this is a slip on the part of the
corporations record-keeper, who simply forgot to note
Memlings name in the register as required. He is certainly
recorded in later years as the master of two apprentices
(1480 and 1483), and his name also features in the obituary
list of the Bruges Guild of St Luke the religious confraternity to which painters belonged. Other than Memling,
only seven out of a total of 245 members of the painters
corporation (all of them, oddly enough, panel painters)
were not registered properly on joining it between 1453
and 1525.14
Memlings personal circumstances remain largely
obscure, too. There are virtually no precise details regarding his financial situation, for example, and what few
secure facts are available are open to interpretation. The
artist evidently lived in 14667 in a complex comprising
two brick buildings on Vlamingdam and Jan Miraelstraat
13
the likely owner of which at the time was a certain Johannes Goddier. Memling himself acquired the larger of the
two houses on which the painter Lodewijk Boels, who
also probably came from Brussels, paid the property tax in
1470 no later than 1479/80; it remains to be ascertained,
however, when the second building was purchased.
Although the fact that Memling became a property
owner is by no means evidence of exceptional prosperity, it nevertheless suggests a solid financial situation and
the savings to go with it. Nor was property ownership
unusual for other panel painters, sculptors, goldsmiths
or members of privileged crafts in general. Calculations
suggest that an average craftsman had to work for about
25years to save the money to buy a house; in Memlings
case, just under fifteen years elapsed between his registration as a Bruges citizen and the purchase of his home. Judging from the tax returns of the district in which his houses
were located, he did not live in one of the more prestigious parts of Bruges but in an area that was chiefly home to
artisans and their families.15 Memlings house and most
likely his workshop, too had the homes of other artists
as direct neighbours: one example is the Utrecht-born illuminator Willem Vrelant, but Gerard David, Jan Provost,
Lancelot Blondeel, Antoon Claeissens and Pieter Pourbus
all subsequently lived in the district as well. It was near the
Augustinian abbey, which was a favoured institution for
the endowment of altars and other foundations by the foreign merchant communities in Bruges particularly those
from Spain, Italy and Nuremberg.16
Significantly, Memling took on his first apprentice, Han
nekin Verhanneman, in 1480 shortly after buying his
own house in Bruges. The second, Passchier van der
Meersch, followed in 1483.17 We may infer from this that
the artists personal and professional situation was in sufficiently good shape at that time to afford him the money
and space he needed to start training apprentices. We
may also safely assume that he was already married by
then to Tanne, who died no later than 1487 leaving the
painter with three under-age children Hannekin, Neelkin and Claykin. The inventory of the familys possessions
drawn up on the death of his wife offers important testimony to the true state of the artists finances and his social
relationships.18 The orphans board in Bruges traditionally awarded guardianship of non-adult offspring to relatives of the deceased parent. In the case of Memlings children, it was the guardians duty to oversee the childrens
14
Borchert
figs.45
Robert Campin
Portrait of a Man; Portrait of a Woman
London, National Gallery
maternal inheritance, which was estimated at the time at

12 livres tournois and probably comprised the wifes dowry.
They came from the higher reaches of the artisan class and
included a goldsmith, which tells us something about the
painters social status and his involvement with the community.
There is, after all, no evidence that Memling enjoyed any
particular social prestige in Bruges that would have enabled him to rise beyond the station of his better-placed
colleagues.19 Late-medieval society was certainly not so
dynamic that his professional relationship with patrons
drawn from the urban lite will have had any lasting
impact on his own status. The extent of his possessions
of which we gain a broad impression from the municipal orphans records places him firmly among the more
prosperous of the citys craftsmen. However, people like
this by no means enjoyed the same opportunities for social
advancement as members of established patrician families,
high-ranking Burgundian court officials or international
financiers all of whom tended to model their lifestyle on
that of the aristocracy.
The painters financial situation was certainly not static;
like those of Bruges other residents, Memlings wealth
was hard hit by the economic crisis of the 1480s and the
accompanying inflation. He had probably earned a certain amount of money before coming to Bruges, and having arrived there, he continued to save in the ensuing years
so that by 1480 he had the funds he needed to buy a house
of his own. He seems to have reached the financial zenith
of his career at this point, as that same summer he was one
of a total of 875 individuals assessed as the richest 10% of
Bruges citizens, who were obliged to finance a loan to the
municipal authorities in support of Archduke Maximilians military campaign against France. Memlings contribution to the compulsory loan was one Flemish pound
an amount extracted from 300 other citizens, too. The
other 574 were required to lend larger amounts, with two
paying as much as 20 Flemish pounds each.20 Much has
been made of this source in the literature, where it has
been taken as evidence of Memlings wealth and social
standing.21 What is overlooked, however, is the fact that
the painters name does not crop up again in connection
with subsequent loans (this method of raising money
was applied at regular intervals from 1487 onwards); nor
is there any trace of the artists name in connection with
the purchase of annuities or lotteries. It may be concluded
15
from this that Memlings financial situation like that

of most of his fellow craftsmen was adversely affected
by the economic crisis that struck Bruges in the 1480s.
Although he was probably able to maintain his standard of living he was not obliged, for instance, to sell off
any of his property he would never again be numbered
amongst the citys wealthiest inhabitants.22
Memlings membership from 1473 of the renowned Confraternity of Our Lady of the Snow is a similarly ambiguous piece of evidence.23 The organization owed its name
to the commemoration all over Flanders every 5 August of
the foundation of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. Judging by the social prestige it enjoyed, it was one of Bruges
most prominent religious brotherhoods. It was originally
founded by the tailors guild, but membership was opened
up in the second half of the fifteenth century to all the
citys professions and crafts. The tailors enjoyed particular esteem within the Bruges crafts hierarchy, and membership of the confraternity was increasingly extended
to representatives of prominent local families and senior
Burgundian court officials. They were joined by wealthy
merchants and diplomats like the Scottish envoy Alexander Bonkil and Giovanni and Michele Arnolfini, and by
Bruges proto-humanists such as Antonius de Roovere
and Aliamus de Groote. Even more important, however,
was the involvement of high-ranking Burgundian-Netherlandish nobles, among them Isabel of Portugal, Charles
the Bold, Philip of Cleves and Louis of Bruges, Lord of
Gruuthuse, which further enhanced the confraternitys
prestige.24 Charles the Bold was especially attached to
the organization, which in 1472 was given its own chapel
in the collegiate church of Our Lady, of which the duke
was the most prominent patron. Unsurprisingly, members of the ducal chapel also belonged to the confraternity
and probably played an active part in its religious services.
Charless court painter Pierre Coustain was a member as
well; for some reason, he paid his membership dues for
nineteen years in advance.25
In addition to Hans Memling himself, the confraternitys membership included his neighbour Willem Vrelant and Petrus Christus and his wife. A distinguished
religious organization, its principal aim was to care for
the souls of its almost one thousand members, many of
whom were undoubtedly drawn from the same circles in
which Memling and Christus customarily sought their
patrons. It is reasonable to assume, therefore, that it was
16
Borchert
fig.6
Rogier van der Weyden
Portrait of a Woman
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Preussischer
Kulturbesitz, Gemldegalerie
fig.7
Jan van Eyck
Portrait of a Man (Leal Souvenir), 1432
gedetoureerde
nog plaatsen
gedetoureerde
nog plaatsen
fig.8
Memling
Portrait of Gilles Joye [cat.3], 1472
Williamstown (Mass.), Sterling and
Francine Clark Art Institute
17
not only religious motives that drew the painters to join

the decision must also have reflected the potential for
contact with prospective customers. However, when
the confraternity commissioned a new painted banner
in 1480, they turned to another member the painter Jan
Fabyaen rather than to Hans Memling.26
The fact that Memling was able to join such a prestigious organization in 1473 barely eight years after moving to Bruges shows that, within the bounds of the wellto-do craft community in which he operated, he was
socially well established in his new home. We ought not,
however, to draw any more far-reaching conclusions; on
the contrary, the evidence suggests that Memling only
belonged to one of Bruges exclusive confraternities,
whereas members of the citys true social lite tended
to be members of several. Petrus Christus, for instance,
also joined the Confraternity of Our Lady of the Dry
Tree, which was based at the Franciscan abbey.27
The reality of Memlings life can, as we have seen, only
be ascertained in fragmentary fashion from surviving
legal and administrative documents; that it did not differ
substantially from that of other established colleagues is,
however, apparent even at the moment of his death. Writing in the fourth book of his Bruges chronicle (which survives only in a sixteenth-century Latin translation), Rombout de Doppere, secretary of the collegiate church of St
Donatians, recorded that Memling died on 11 August
1494. As noted above, De Doppere stated that the artist
had been born in Mainz and also recorded his burial in the
cemetery of the church of StGiles in Bruges (sepultus Brugis ad Aegidii ) the parish in which the artists house was
located.28 The painters finances did not stretch to a burial place inside the church, as was customary for members
of Bruges social lite. Of all the artists active in the city in
the fifteenth century, Jan van Eyck seems to have been the
only one to have enjoyed the privilege of being interred
inside a church and St Donatians at that. Even in Van
Eycks case, however, this was not until after his brother
succeeded in having the body transferred to the church,
which also functioned as the ducal chapel.29
Memlings resting place, by contrast, is entirely in keeping with his social status and profession. It is intriguing,
none the less, that the artist did not make arrangements
fora requiem mass to be celebrated for him in Bruges,
unlike several of his fellow painters we know to have done
so. The only archival evidence of a memorial service held
18
Borchert
for him in Bruges appears in the records of the Confraternity of Our Lady of the Snow; and, curiously, another
memorial mass is recorded half a century after his death
in his Middle Rhine birthplace.30 All this bolsters the conclusion to be drawn from a critical reading of contemporary documents touching on the circumstances of Memlings life, namely that he was a prosperous but by no
means especially wealthy member of his profession and
that, unlike the case of Van Eyck, his artistic talents did
not lead to any special privileges.
Another aspect deserves our attention in this context:
as noted earlier, Memling was the only one of the Bruges
painters we have been able to identify in the fifteenth
and early sixteenth centuries who appears never to have
received official commissions from either the city or the
Franc of Bruges (the surrounding jurisdiction). He is
equally invisible when it comes to the large-scale decorative commissions handed out by the civic authorities and
the Burgundian court in 1468 in connection with Charles
the Bolds ceremonial entry into Bruges, the subsequent
chapter meeting of the Order of the Golden Fleece and,
finally, the celebrations marking the dukes marriage to
Margaret of York.31 To ensure that the huge decorative
paintings would be ready on time, the court was obliged
to bring painters to Bruges from all over the dukes territories Jacques Daret and Hugo van der Goes among
them.32 Locally based artists appear to have been entirely
engaged on the citys behalf with decorations for processions and the organization of a large number of tableaux
vivants; Petrus Christus, for instance, was paid to restore
a Tree of Jesse for the traditional Holy Blood Procession,
which coincided with the chapter meeting of the Golden
Fleece.33
Memlings name, by contrast, is nowhere to be found in
the civic accounts covering the festivities in question. It is
entirely feasible, of course, that not every painter who contributed to the decorative works was specifically named
in the accounts some of them might, after all, have subcontracted some of the work to other artists whom they
paid directly. However, unlike Petrus Christus, Memling
did not receive official commissions from the Bruges civic
authorities at any time in his career; this, allied with the
fact that he began to work for highly positioned patrons
immediately after arriving in the city, suggests that there
were other factors behind the artists failure to participate
in the decorative commissions that arose in 1468.
fig.9
Master of the St Ursula Legend
Portrait of Ludovico Portinari
Philadelphia Museum of Art,
John G. Johnson Collection
One plausible explanation is that Memling was able to

specialize in panel painting from the outset and that the
commissions he received removed any financial imperative to bother with restoration work, ephemeral decorations or paintings on canvas. In 1478/9, Memling was commissioned to paint wings for a carved wooden shrine for
the book illuminators (librarirs) guild, based at Eekhout
Abbey in Bruges. Unlike his contemporaries in the city,
whom the records show to have carried out similar work on
a regular basis, this is the only commission of its kind that
Memling is known to have accepted. Willem Vrelant, himself a book illuminator and member of the guild, appears to
have acted as intermediary and financier; later descriptions
of the now-lost altarpiece reveal that the painter included
portraits of Vrelant and his wife in the wings.34
The lost donor wings of the illuminators altarpiece are
the only Memling commission, moreover, to be mentioned in contemporary sources. He had already been living in Bruges for almost fifteen years when he received it
in 1478/9; he was an established painter in the city and, as
far as we can tell, was at the financial peak of his career. He
could also look back on an impressive sequence of important commissions carried out during the stable political
and economic climate of the late 1460s and 1470s.
The fact that some of those commissions were received
immediately after his arrival in Bruges suggests that he
must already have built up a solid reputation by that time,
probably thanks to the period he spent working in Van
der Weydens atelier. Memling seems to have collaborated
most likely in Brussels on a large altarpiece for Ferry
de Clugny (died 1483) which remained unfinished on Van
der Weydens death but was subsequently completed
in his workshop. All that now remains of that work is a
monumental Annunciation scene (New York, Metropolitan Museum).35 Clugny was a senior Burgundian official
who was appointed chancellor of the Order of the Golden
Fleece in 1473 and Bishop of Tournai a year later; Memling
might have made his acquaintance through the aforementioned commission. A courtier of such prominence could
undoubtedly have recommended Memling to influential
patrons in Bruges, although the painters earlier collaboration with Rogier might have been sufficient recommendation in itself.
Whatever the case, shortly after settling in Bruges, Mem
ling was commissioned to paint a triptych, the com
ponentparts of which are now to be found in several
19
ifferent collections; the original configuration is known,

d
however, thanks to a copy dating from the seventeenth
oreighteenth century.36 Attributed to Memling on stylistic grounds, the painting is relatively modest in size and is
likely to have been destined for the altar of a private chapel
or oratory. The centre panel shows the crucified Christ
surrounded by the Virgin, Saints John the Evangelist,
Mary Magdalene, John the Baptist, Bernard of Clairvaux
and a Cistercian abbot kneeling in prayer. Two other worshippers an elderly woman and a younger man appear
in the wings, each under the protection of their respec
tivepatron saints, Anne and William of Maleval (fig.13);
the closed wings have an Annunciation scene. The donor,
who is accompanied by his patron saint, John the Baptist,
and by the founder of his Order, St Bernard, is no less a
figure than Jan Crabbe, abbot (145788) of the powerful
Cistercian abbey of Ter Duinen near Koksijde. Crabbe
instructed the artist to include his 80-year-old mother,
Anne Willemszoon, and his nephew, Willem de Winter.37
The condition of the individual panels especially that of
the central Crucifixion is far from perfect, substantially
affecting our ability to judge their appearance. Because
ofits heavily abraded surface, from which the fine layers
of glaze that provided the modelling have entirely disappeared, the central panel now creates an oddly clumsy
impression and contrasts, at least partially, with donor
wings that are more characteristic of Memling.
For the composition of this Crucifixion scene which, if
only for the prominent and exacting patron,38 must have
been an important commission Memling resorted to the
example of his recently deceased teacher, Rogier van der
Weyden, and hence to Brussels painting in general, offering persuasive evidence in the process of his artistic background. Rogiers influence is immediately apparent in early
works such as the Brussels Virgin and Child (fig.12), which
no doubt formed part of a small portrait diptych or triptych (fig.33). The repertoire of motifs and styles on which
Memling drew in the Triptych of Jan Crabbe is set out
in Van der Weydens Crucifixion triptych for Oberto Villa
(Riggisberg), and above all in his Vienna Crucifixion and in
the triptych for Alessandro Sforza that has been attributed
to his workshop.39 The triptychs detailed underdrawing,
done with the paintbrush, is also closely related to Rogier
in terms of graphical repertoire and strongly resembles a
number of drawings that have recently been attributed to
Rogiers Brussels follower Vrancke van der Stockt.40
20
Borchert
fig.10
Memling
Diptych of the Virgin and Child with
Angels, St George and a Donor
Munich, Alte Pinakothek
fig.11
Detail of fig.10
THB_04B
21
Another commission that Hans Memling received in the

1460s appears substantially more important and artistically far more ambitious; it emanated from the Florentine
banker Agnolo (or Angelo) Tani, who ran the Medicis
Bruges operations between 1450 and 1464. The painting, a Last Judgement triptych now in the Muzeum Naro
dowe in Gdansk, is one of the largest works that Memling ever produced (figs.14, 41);41 its turbulent history has
been discussed at length on a number of occasions. The
triptych was ordered from Memling by Agnolo di Jacopo
Tani, head of the Medici bank in Bruges, for his chapel
in the Badia Fiesolana. The finished work was dispatched
by sea in 1473 by Tommaso Portinari, his successor in the
Flemish city. It was carried by a Florentine galley operating under the Burgundian flag, which set off from Bruges
outport of Sluis to sail to Pisa via England. Shortly after
departing, however, it was captured off Gravelines on 27
April 1473 by the privateer Paul Bennecke from Danzig
(Gdansk). Memlings Last Judgement altarpiece was landed
in the northern German town of Stade with the rest of the
booty, where it was claimed by members of the Danzig
crew. In spite of Portinaris protests and written interventions, they subsequently had it installed in the chapel of
the Confraternity of St George in Danzigs church of Our
Lady.42 We thus know that the triptych, which would
inevitably have taken several years to paint, was completed no later than 1473; it is unclear, however, precisely
when Tani first placed the commission.
The Florentine banker had already left Bruges for his
native city by the end of April 1464 to get his contract
extended. While he was away, Portinari managed to
have himself appointed head of the Bruges branch by the
Medici in 1465. Relations between Portinari and Tani cannot have been affected by this as dramatically as the literature tends to claim, as professional business contacts
between the two bankers continued largely as if nothing
had happened. Tani, who retained a financial stake in the
Bruges operation, married Caterina Tanagli in Florence
in 1466. As Caterina, whose family were wealthy merchants, appears on the closed wings of the altarpiece opposite her husband, and as she had been engaged to Filippo
Strozzi until September 1465, it would seem that Memling did not receive the commission for the painting until
after the couples wedding. Furthermore, the aisle chapels
in the Badia Fiesolana were completed no earlier than the
end of 1466, when Francesco Sassetti was the first to be
22
Borchert
fig.12
Memling
Virgin and Child
Brussels, Muses Royaux
des Beaux-Arts de Belgique
fig.13
Memling
Triptych of Jan Crabbe
Vicenza, Museo Civico (centre panel);
New York, The Pierpont Morgan
Library (wings)
23
THB_10_101_VEBR
LC_102_VEBR
24
Borchert
THB_10_101_VEBR
THB_10_101_VEBR
THB_10_101_VEBR
THB_10_101_VEBR
granted endowment rights there, followed shortly afterwards by Tani.43 Tani may therefore have conceived the
idea of installing a Flemish altarpiece in his family chapel
a move that must have seemed nothing short of spectacular given the time and place some time in 1467, when he
realized that he would have to return to Northern Europe
on business; the London branch of the Medici bank had
run into financial difficulty and he was ordered to go and
sort things out.
On 12 December 1467 he drew up a will naming his wife
as beneficiary in the event of his death and then set off
over land for London, arriving there on 12 January 1468.44
Although it is not implausible to imagine Tani pausing
briefly in Bruges to order the triptych at that point, it is
more likely (if we leave aside the possibility that the order
was placed by letter) that the altarpiece commission was
not placed with Memling until the summer of 1468. Tanis
duties in England included the financing of Margaret of
York and Charles the Bolds wedding the London branch
of the Medici bank loaned Edward IV 10,000
1.000 pounds to
help pay for the event. The guarantor was Sir John Donne
of Kidwelly, who also went on to commission a triptych
from Memling (see below). It is highly probable that Tani
came back to Bruges in mid-1468 as part of Margaret of
Yorks retinue.45
The opulently staged wedding celebrations, at which
Tommaso Portinari paraded at the head of a horseback
contingent from Bruges Florentine merchant community, took place in July 1468. Tani would have had plenty
of time to specify his wishes regarding the commission
and to negotiate payment and delivery details with Memling. He would also have had to provide the artist with an
Italian portrait drawing of his young wife who had never
visited the Netherlands as the basis for her donors portrait (the style of which suggests that an artist from the circle of Filippo Lippi might have been responsible for the
drawing). He would then have returned to his business
commitments in London. Tani spent several more weeks
in the Netherlands in the summer of 1469, before finally
returning that autumn to Florence and his wife, who bore
him a daughter in 1471.46
It is intriguing to speculate that during his 1469 visit
to Flanders, Tani took the opportunity to ascertain how
Memlings work was progressing and to further specify
how he wanted the finished painting to look. The artist
would then have done his best to accommodate his clients
fig.14af
Memling
The Last Judgement triptych, details
Gdansk, Muzeum Narodowe
25
wishes. Memling certainly made far-reaching changes to

the composition at a fairly advanced stage of execution;
these include the insertion of the Apostle group on either
side of the Deesis (Christ sitting in judgement with his
mother and John the Baptist) and the reconfiguration of
the donors coat of arms. Although we cannot say whether
Tani really did visit Memling in person, alterations of
this significance can only have occurred on the patrons
express instruction.47
The composition of Memlings Last Judgement is heavily
indebted to the polyptych on the same theme that Rogier
van der Weyden painted in the mid-1440s for the hospital
founded in Beaune by Nicolas Rolin, the powerful Burgundian chancellor;48 this too may have been a specific
request on the part of the Florentine banker. Yet there are
signs in this work that Memling was beginning to assimilate the painting of Jan van Eyck, too. The triptych is characterized by its ambitious artistic effects, the elaborate
foreshortening of the naked human bodies and the emulation of intricate surfaces and refined reflections; it is as if
Memling wanted to show off his painterly skills and to lay
claim to a place among the first rank of Flanders artists.
Whatever the case, this highly prestigious commission seems to have attracted the attention and interest of
the Italian businessmen who lived or traded in Bruges.
Numerous members of the Florentine and apparently
the Venetian merchant communities in Bruges seem to
have commissioned portraits from Memling while he was
still working on Tanis altarpiece; moreover, the souls of
the blessed in the Last Judgement triptych have the faces of
Florentine merchants, possibly in return for those same
commissions (see cat.13 and fig.14ab). Memling appears
to have introduced landscape backgrounds for the portraits of his Italian customers at an early stage, while continuing to paint his local patrons in front of a neutral background in keeping with their more conservative tastes.49
Even Tommaso Portinari Tanis alleged rival commissioned Memling around that time to paint himself and
his new bride Maria Bandini Baroncelli, probably to mark
the couples wedding in 1470 (pl.2). Their portraits functioned as the wings of a folding devotional triptych whose
centre panel undoubtedly a Virgin and Child has been
lost. Memling took the devotional diptych developed by
Rogier van der Weyden and turned it into a triptych.50
The highly refined and prestigious work cannot have been
intended purely for private worship: it must have been
26
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available to at least a limited extent for public viewing

probably at Portinaris residence, the Hof Bladelin.
It was also around 147072 that the Florentine banker
who in the meantime had become a councillor and confidant of Charles the Bold commissioned Memling to
paint a Passion of Christ (Turin, Galleria Sabauda), which
might first have been displayed in Portinaris private
chapel in the church of St James, before passing into
Medici ownership in the sixteenth century.51 The painting
consists of a panoramic, fictive view of Jerusalem, within
which Memling placed miniature scenes from the Passion, beginning with Christs entry into the city and ending with the journey to Emmaus. The simultaneous visual
narrative appears to be rooted in early fifteenth-century
German panel painting, tapestry cycles and Flemish book
illumination particularly the illustration of historical
chronicles.52 Although, strictly speaking, Memling had
already applied the simultaneous narrative principle in his
Last Judgement, it was only in this Passion cycle painted for
Tommaso Portinari that he consistently presented historical events in this way. The technique can be found to some
extent in works produced by Rogier van der Weydens
workshop the Miraflores and St John altarpieces (both
Berlin, Gemldegalerie), for instance and has also been
hypothetically linked on occasion with lost early works by
Jan van Eyck.53
Memling must have worked on Portinaris Passion of
Christ while he was still putting the finishing touches to
his Last Judgement, and evidently experienced no difficulty
in switching between the latters monumental mode and
the miniature approach of the former. During this masterful and versatile performance, he also found time to try
out new and innovative pictorial concepts alongside his
more conventional visual repertoire.
Tanis Last Judgement and the commissions to which it
gave rise among the Italian diaspora in Flanders must have
substantially enhanced Memlings reputation as a painter.
He appears to have received a whole series of orders in the
early 1470s, including the Virgin and Child with St Anthony
Abbot and a Donor (cat.4 and fig.15), which is inscribed
with the date 1472. This painting illustrates Memlings
special gift for developing new compositions from a limited repertoire of motifs the configuration of the Virgin and Child and the donor figure both derive from the
same models, which the artist also used for the scene on
the closed wings of the Last Judgement altarpiece. At the
kleurkwaliteit twijfelachtig
fig.15
Memling
The Virgin and Child with St Anthony
Abbot and a Donor [cat.4], 1472,
detail of pl.5
Ottawa, National Gallery of Canada
fig.16
Jan van Eyck
The Virgin and Child
with Chancellor Rolin, detail
Paris, Muse du Louvre
same time, we detect signs that Memling was increasingly coming to terms with Bruges painting. In addition
to the formal vocabulary of his Brussels master Rogier van
der Weyden, he was now also incorporating in his work
motifs from Van Eyck whose Virgin and Child with Chancellor Rolin (fig.16) may be cited in this instance and, to a
lesser extent, Petrus Christus. He was to take this diverse
range of influences and to merge them into a style of his
own.54
The Triptych of the Two Saints John (fig.17), completed in 1479 and originally displayed on the high altar of
the chapel in St Johns Hospital, Bruges, illustrates Memlings achievement in terms of synthesizing his forebears
work: he has taken the influences of Rogier and Van Eyck
and independently assimilated them in his own composition, merging them and linking them with his own means
of expression. Memling proudly signed the altarpiece on
its surviving, original frame: Opus Iohannis Memling 1479.
As one of his two signed works, it forms the joint basis
onwhich art historians have sought to reconstruct his
oeuvre.55
The central focus of the monumental triptych is an
image of the Virgin and Child enthroned beneath an
imposing brocade canopy and flanked by Saints Barbara
and Catherine, John the Baptist and John the Evangelist.
Memling has incorporated episodes from the lives of the
hospitals two patron saints in the background of the central panel, where they link in narratively with the principal
scenes depicted in the wings. The visual narrative culminates on the left with the beheading of John the Baptist a
composition based on the St John altarpiece from Van der
Weydens atelier. The equivalent scene on the right shows
St John the Evangelist on Patmos, his apocalyptic vision
presented as a simultaneous visual cycle that is one of the
most magnificent and individual pictorial inventions ever.
Memling plainly had in mind the spatial disposition
of Jan van Eycks Virgin and Child with Canon Van der
Paele still located at the time in the church of St Donatian (fig.18)56 when laying out the central panel of the
triptych. Above all, the compositional type with the
enthroned Virgin and Child surrounded by a small group
of saints the sacra conversazione format popular in Italy
must have been a crucial source of inspiration. Although
Petrus Christus had already adopted this scheme around
1450,57 it seems chiefly to have been Memling who, having
expanded it to include the female saints kneeling on the
27
ground, established its lasting popularity first in Bruges

painting and then in early Netherlandish art as a whole.58
The decisive influence on Memlings presentation of the
scene appears not to have been Christus, but alongside
Van Eyck compositions by Van der Weyden and his circle, most notably a Virgin and Child with Saints now known
only through fragments and copies.59
Memling must have received the commission to paint
a triptych for the high altar of Bruges most prominent
hospital community immediately after completing his
Last Judgement altarpiece. The mere fact that it was evidently the first time that one of the citys long-established
28
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institutions had ordered a painting from Memling must

have been of special significance. St Johns was founded
in 1188 and was one of three hospitals in Bruges overseen
by the city authorities. Following a dispute between the
hospital and the city council a conflict that took on all
the dimensions of a power struggle the institution fell
in 1459 under the sole care of the Bishop of Tournai, following which the monks and nuns who made up the hospital community had to perform their duties in Augustinian habits. The situation did not, however, persist: it
was agreed in 1463 that city and bishop would henceforth
share oversight of St Johns, with the bishop permitted to
fig.17
Memling
Triptych of the Two Saints John,
centre panel
Memlingmuseum
Sint-Janshospitaal
fig.18
Jan van Eyck
The Virgin and Child with Saints
andCanon Van der Paele, 1436
Groeningemuseum
29
fig.19
Detail of fig.20
examine the hospitals finances and the city given a say in

the appointment of key personnel.60 The triptych commission for the high altar was probably connected with a
new apsidal choir for the hospital chapel, on which building work began in1473/4. The new choir was dedicated
in 1477 by Ferry de Clugny, who had been ordained as
Bishop of Tournai in 1474.61
Given the relations between the hospital governors, the
Bishop of Tournai and Bruges city council, it is hard to
imagine that the commission would have been placed
with Memling without prior consultation with the hospitals administrators; nominally, however, it appears to
30
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have been the hospitals friars and nuns themselves who

acted as patrons for the altarpiece and it is their portraits
that appear on the closed wings of the triptych, accompanied by Saints James, Anthony, Agnes and Clare. The
hospital possessed relics of these saints, who were also
invoked against a variety of illnesses, both of which circumstances explain their presence on the hospitals high
altar. They may also have been the patron saints of the
depicted hospital staff, whom James Weale identified as
prioress Agnes Casembrood with Clara van Hulsen, and
master Antheunis Seghers with Jacob Ceuninc; however,
neither Jacob Ceuninc nor Clara van Hulsen held an offi-
fig.20
Memling
Triptych of the Two Saints John,
closed wings
Memlingmuseum
Sint-Janshospitaal
cial management post at the hospital or belonged to its

community in the period from the placing of the commission in 1473/4 to its completion in 1479.62
The monumental donors portraits in the St John altarpiece (fig.20) are possibly among the latest examples of
the placement of the patrons likenesses on the closed
wings customary Netherlandish practice in the 1430s
and 1440s and exemplified in Van Eycks Ghent Altarpiece and Van der Weydens Last Judgement polyptych in
Beaune. They might even have appeared anachronistic at
the time. Memling comes up here with an impressive solution to an apparent lack of internal logic: the four mem-
bers of the hospital community kneel facing one another,

their hands clasped in prayer, even though there is no sign
in the painted wings themselves of the actual object of
their devotions. The viewer has to know about the image
of the Madonna, conceived in the form of a sacra conversa
zione, that lies hidden in the triptych until being displayed
on holy days only then is the donors worship encompassed in the iconographic programme. At the same time,
the ambiguity of this devotional gesture enables Memling
to incorporate the physical space of the chapel itself to
which the paintings jutting tracery lays claim into the
pictorial scheme of his altarpiece. Those who viewed the
31
altarpiece in its original position will immediately have

been struck by the link between the image in the closed
wings and the chapel altar, towards which the donor
group would have been oriented. This brilliant pictorial
artifice drawing the actual altar out of its real space into
a supernatural present, does not, paradoxically, enhance
the realism of the work. The effect is heightened by the
carefully staged lighting, which causes the tracery to cast
artfully diffuse shadows on the even rear wall (fig.19) and
is evidently not of this world, falling as it does from the
north onto an altar oriented towards the east.
Just as the Last Judgement altarpiece for Agnolo Tani won
Memling a number of commissions from the local Italian merchant community, the Triptych of the Two Saints
John completed, so the inscription tells us, in 1479
appears to have elicited a series of follow-up orders. Memlings work for the Hospital of St John seemingly made
him acceptable for the first time to local patrons, who
32
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now began to commission altarpieces from him for their

guild chapels; in addition to the lost wings for the altar of
the illuminators guild (see above), these included an altarpiece with the Seven Joys of the Virgin endowed in 1479 by
Pieter Bultinc for the tanners chapel in the choir of Our
Ladys in Bruges. Once again, the work was conceived as
a simultaneous visual narrative.63 For other commissions,
it was evidently the patrons explicit wish that Memling
should essentially reprise the composition of the central
panel of the St John altarpiece: examples are the Virgin and
Child with Saints and Angels,64 painted for an unidentified
patron, and the Donne Triptych, which was commissioned by the aforementioned Welsh diplomat Sir John
Donne of Kidwelly and his wife Elizabeth Hastings, probably in 1480 (see fig.43).65
Finally, there were orders for small, private altarpieces
from other members of the hospital community: also
inscribed with the name of Hans Memling and the date
figs.2122
Memling
Triptych of Jan Floreins, 1479,
open and closed
Memlingmuseum
Sint-Janshospitaal
(1479) on the frame is the Adoration of the Kings which, the

inscription on the original frame goes on to tell us, was
commissioned by Jan Floreins (figs.2122).66 Floreins,
who joined the hospital community in 1471/2, belonged to
an aristocratic family from Hainaut and probably came to
Bruges from Boussu near Mons; he chose scenes from the
Childhood of Christ to adorn his private altar. The central panel shows him at the age of 36 as a witness to the
Epiphany (see fig.40), the composition of which Memling
borrowed and simplified from the Adoration scene in Van
der Weydens Columba Altarpiece (fig.23). It is flanked
by the Nativity in the left wing and the Presentation in the
Temple in the right.
The structure and composition of the triptych echo
those of another that Memling probably painted several years earlier (Madrid, Prado), which is also based on
Rogiers Columba Altarpiece, but which is significantly
larger.67 The closed wings show Saints John the Baptist
and Veronica sitting in front of a landscape that stretches

into the distance. John points towards the Mystic Lamb,
while Veronica holds up the cloth she used to wipe the
sweat from Christs brow as he carried the Cross and on
which his face miraculously appeared. Memling had previously used both of these motifs in a diptych68 commissioned by the Venetian envoy Bernardo Bembo, who left
the Netherlands in 1474 (see cat.10). In the Triptych of
Jan Floreins, however, the two figures are framed by a
stone arch with marvellous trompe-lil tracery that seems
to imitate the actual architecture of the late Gothic tabernacle fragment which can still be seen in St Johns Hospital. The stone archway is decorated with imitation statues representing the Fall of Man and the Expulsion of
Adam and Eve from Paradise; their purpose is to illustrate
the necessity of Christs sacrificial death, as implied by
the lamb and Veronicas cloth. The images on the closed
wings are themselves set in illusionistic marble frames on
33
which the patrons initials if have been painted in the

form of a golden cord, while the patrons high social status is revealed by the shields incorporated at the top. The
small triptych is one of Memlings most exquisite works
in terms of both content and execution, despite the fact
that its individual elements had already been developed in
other contexts elsewhere in his work.
The Lamentation triptych that Adriaan Reins commissioned from Memling to mark his admission to the hospital community in 1479 dates from a year later (see fig.42).69
The triptych resembles that of Jan Floreins in terms of its
structure, but the overall effect is more modest something that is especially plain from the less artfully rendered
architectural framing in the little altarpieces closed wings.
The frame lacks both the inscription and the coats of arms
we see in the Floreins Triptych. Even the conspicuous
donors initials on the closed wings are missing, though
they do appear on the frame at the bottom of the central
Lamentation scene. The difference in height between the
outer panels and the central scene, together with stylistic
discrepancies, suggests that the Lamentation panel had
already been finished and was completed by the addition
of wings showing the donor and his patron saint on the
left and St Barbara on the right. The triptych thus seems
to bear out the hypothesis that Memling produced certain
popular scenes in advance, confident that demand would
remain steady; all he would then have had to do would be
to personalize the wings for the specific purchaser.
Memling appears in the course of the 1480s to have produced more and more versions of particularly admired
compositions in advance, as a substantial proportion of his
output from that period onwards is marked by far-reaching standardization, including size. This applied above all
to half- and full-length images of the Virgin and Child. He
tended to use variations on a basic composition, to which
he occasionally added one or more angels. For the background, he alternated between landscapes and interiors
(see cat.23, pl.25). An interesting example is provided by
Memlings composition with the enthroned Virgin and
Child beneath a canopy; three different versions survive
two with swags of fruit added for decoration but the
variations between them are marginal. All three include
naked putti, which are generally interpreted as evidence of
the burgeoning influence of Italian Renaissance ornamentation, causing the panels to be given a late date towards
the end of the 1480s.70 They served as the central panels
34
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of triptychs, the original configuration of which has survived in one case and can be reconstructed in another. The
one that has survived is now in Vienna and consists of a
triptych with wings showing John the Baptist and John
the Evangelist; the closed wings have images of Adam and
Eve. The size difference between the centre panel and the
wings once again suggests that the work was assembled
from elements produced in advance. It has long been
known, meanwhile, that the donor figure kneeling on
the right before the Virgin and Child was overpainted
and that a Cistercian abbot originally appeared there.
This might well have been another commission from
Jan Crabbe, who died in 1488, leaving the work unpaid
for and probably unfinished in Memlings workshop.
The painter evidently had little trouble in finding another
buyer for the left-over picture and merely had to update
the donor portrait.71
The original arrangement of the second triptych was
only recently reconstructed and its patron identified. The
central panel, featuring the enthroned Virgin and Child,
is now in Florence. Instead of a donor figure, a harp-playing angel appears on the right. The scene formed a triptych with a pair of wings (London) showing John the Baptist and StLawrence on the inside and a group of cranes
on the outside. The work was commissioned from Memlings workshop by the Dominican bishop Benedetto
Pagagnotti, probably through intermediaries. The painter
turned to a standard composition, which he personalized
to a certain extent with wings designed specifically for this
patron.72 The Triptych of Benedetto Pagagnotti clearly
shows that while Memling may have painted works for
stock or at the very least resorted to a degree of standardization this in no way entails a qualitative sacrifice in
terms of technical execution; nor is it necessarily evidence
of increased input on the part of workshop assistants.
Memling increasingly produced panels of standard
dimensions and compositions in the 1480s speculating
on persistent, anonymous demand which he then incorporated in diptychs and triptychs for individual c lients
(figs.10, 24). He nonetheless continued to receive major
commissions for larger altarpieces, the iconography of
which was conceived according to the donors specific
wishes. Those donors appear around the mid-1480s to
have been primarily members of Bruges patrician class.
First and foremost among these works is the Moreel
Triptych (cat.22, pl.24), which Memling painted for the
THB_34_V_CAT21
THB_34_V_CAT21
THB_34_V_CAT21
fig.23ac
The Columba Altarpiece,
details of left wing, centre panel
andright wing
Munich, Alte Pinakothek
influential Bruges politician, banker and merchant Willem Moreel and his wife Barbara van Vlaenderberch alias
Van Hertsvelde. The commission was linked with the
Moreels endowment of a family altar devoted to Saints
Maur and Giles at the church of St James in Bruges in
1484/5. They received permission to install a prestigious
altarpiece, together with the right to be buried in the
church. The year 1484 that appears on the frame thus
refers most likely to the year of the endowment rather
than the date the altarpiece was completed.
Memlings composition is rather unusual for Netherlandish painting and will undoubtedly have reflected the
specific requirements of the foundation. In formal terms,
the central scene featuring Saints Christopher, Maur and
Giles corresponds with the rows of saints to be found in
German and Italian painting; however, there are indications at least that Memling turned for the figure of
StChristopher to a lost composition of Van Eyck which
was also copied by, among others, Dieric Bouts.73 The
triptych is one of the earliest examples of the family group

portraits that became increasingly fashionable in Flanders in the 1480s and which suggest a shifting attitude
on the part of a section of the social lite specifically the
urban patrician class towards the family and matters of
descent.
The Moreel Triptych reminds us in this respect of the socalled Altarpiece of Jacob Floreins (fig.25), which shows
the Virgin and Child enthroned in the interior of a church
and gives a prominent place to the portraits of the donors
and the couples children. The painting dates from around
the late 1480s and was probably conceived as a s ingle panel.
There are clear echoes of Van Eycks Virgin and Child with
Canon Van der Paele (fig.18), while the Madonnas figure
and throne derive from a standard model of Memlings,
on which the artist produced several variations in the latter part of his career. The traditional identification of the
donor as Jan Floreinss brother, the spice merchant Jacob
Floreins, who died in 1488, dates back to Weale but can
35
fig.24
Memling
Diptych of Jean du Cellier
by no means be considered secure.74 Although the context

in which the painting was commissioned and executed
remains a puzzle, we may still assume that it was originally intended as an altarpiece to adorn a private chapel of
a high-ranking patrician or merchant family. The clothes
and above all the jewellery illustrate the considerable
wealth enjoyed by the donor family, several members of
which evidently belonged to the priesthood or a monastic order. It is likely to have been the woman in widows
garb who commissioned the painting from Memling and
his workshop to commemorate her late husband.75
In addition to large altarpieces, the latter half of the
1480s also saw the production of smaller works intended
for private worship in the form of devotional diptychs and
triptychs. The fact that works of this kind by no means
rendered the large and prominent altarpiece obsolete is
evident from Willem Moreel and his wifes commissioning of a devotional triptych from Memling at more or
36
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less the same time as their celebrated altarpiece. Meanwhile, the prominent inclusion of coats of arms and mottos on the back of the portrait wing suggests that, despite
their small size and use in private devotion, works like this
remained prestigious objects which, we can safely assume,
had an at least limited public function (see cat.18).
It is significant in this respect that around the same time
that Memling was painting the Moreel Triptych and
receiving the commission for the so-called Altarpiece
of Jacob Floreins, Maarten van Nieuwenhove another
member of an influential Bruges patrician family also
ordered a Marian diptych from him. The painter was evidently drawing his most important clients at this stage primarily from the ranks of Bruges leading citizens, whereas
the Italian merchant commissions that had featured so
prominently at the outset of his career, appear to have
played only a minor role in his output by the 1480s. The
Diptych of Maarten van Nieuwenhove is inscribed with
fig.25
Memling
Altarpiece of Jacob Floreins
the date 1487 and was almost certainly displayed in an oratory. It is undoubtedly one of Memlings most original and
successful pictorial inventions, even though the Madonna
wing actually derives once again from a standard model
(see cat.23).76
Compared with the demand with which Memling was
confronted in the final decade of his life primarily on
the part of Bruges high bourgeoisie he seems to have
received virtually no further important commissions from
guilds or ecclesiastical institutions. There was an exception, though, in the shape of the St Ursula Casket (finished in 1489), which the artist painted for the community
at St Johns Hospital (figs.2, 26). Memling uses six scenes
to recount the story of St Ursula and her virgin companions, the miniature images of which stylistically recall the
simultaneous narratives he painted for Tommaso Portinari (around 1470) and Pieter Bultinc (1480). The detailed
view of Cologne in the background to three of the scenes
is very striking and has been cited in the literature as evidence of an early stay in the German city. However, a tradition recorded among the hospital community in the
nineteenth century has it that Memling was once sent to
Cologne on the hospitals behalf an account that seems
more likely.77
Similarly, Memling appears to have worked only occasionally for foreign patrons after the early 1480s. It was not
to him but to Hugo van der Goes that Tommaso Portinari
turned for a monumental triptych for his family endowment at Santa Maria Nuova in Florence (see fig.62); other
Italians, meanwhile, no longer ordered paintings only
from Memling, but also from minor Bruges masters like
the Master of the Legend of St Ursula and the Master of
the Legend of St Lucy. Demand for portraits, in particular, on which Memling seemed to boast a virtual monopoly at the beginning of his career in Bruges, appears to
have waned drastically by the end of the century, with the
genre only undergoing a renaissance in the Netherlands in
the early part of the sixteenth century (fig.81).
It was not until the final years of Memlings life that foreign merchants primarily Spaniards and Germans this
time began to commission Netherlandish panel paintings and especially altarpieces once again; Memling too
was able to benefit for a while. Around 1490, he received
acommission for a large altarpiece, probably through the
intermediary of Castilian wool traders, who enjoyed close
business relations with Flanders. The work was to consist
37
fig.26ab
Memling
St Ursula Casket, details
Memlingmuseum
Sint-Janshospitaal
of multiple panels on the theme of the Assumption and

Coronation of the Virgin and was destined for the church
of the prominent monastery of Santa Mara la Real in
Njera (La Rioja). All that now survives are three monumental panels with God the Father and an orchestra of
angels (Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten) that originally formed the upper tier of the ensemble
and which paraphrased Van Eycks Ghent Altarpiece.
The completed work was enormous and Memling must
have produced it with considerable assistance from his
workshop and other colleagues; we do not know, however, precisely when the altarpiece was completed or how
it was transported to Spain.78
The Passion triptych inscribed with the year 1491 in L
beck was probably Memlings final large commission (see
fig.29); here, too, the date might refer to the year the altar
was endowed rather than when the painting was com-
38
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pleted, as the Hanseatic merchants who left Bruges in 1488

did not return until 1491.79 The altarpiece owes its doublewinged configuration to a type customary in the Baltic
region and was commissioned by a member of a Lbeck
patrician family the merchant Heinrich Greverade, who
was active in Flanders, or his brother Adolf, who enrolled
as a theology student at the University of Leuven in 1495.
The work was destined for the Greverades family chapel
in Lbeck Cathedral, where Memlings painting was
securely documented for the first time in 1504.80 There
are strong indications that the completed painting did not
arrive in Lbeck until after Memlings death, as the family also commissioned a Calvary scene in 1494 from local
artist Hermen Rode, which does not contain the slightest
echo of the Bruges painters work.81
By the time Memling received the Lbeck commission,
he was no longer viewed as the only artist in his adopted
fig.27
Jan van Eyck
Portrait of Jan de Leeuw, 1436
Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum
fig.28
Gerard David
Portrait of a Goldsmith
Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum
city; when, for instance, the Confraternity of the Black

Heads a merchants association in Reval (now Tallinn)
decided around the same time to commission a prestigious double-winged altarpiece dedicated to their patron
saints and featuring their group portrait, they did not turn
to Memling, but to a younger contemporary of his, the
anonymous Master of the Legend of St Lucy (fig.30).82
Italian merchants and financiers, influential local families

and even a few of the citys craftsmen that had been commissioning paintings from Flemish artists since the 1430s.
Along with courtiers, churchmen, guilds and confraternities, this urban lite, taking its cultural lead from the
Burgundian nobility, ensured plentiful employment for
painters like Memling as they sought to make their mark
through, amongst other things, substantial religious en
It is plain from this survey of Memlings life and work in dowments.83
Bruges from 1465 to his death in August 1494 just how
The political climate of the Burgundian Netherlands
closely his career was intertwined with the historical and of Bruges in particular was thrown into turmoil by
events of the time. The first fifteen years of his activity in the death of Charles the Bold in January 1477, although
the Flemish city coincided with the final stages of a period the regions economy had already been gradually destabiof unusual economic and political stability that accom- lized by Charless aggressive pursuit of expansion. It took
panied the zenith of Burgundian power from the 1450s. some time, however, before the crisis also began to affect
Founded on commerce and finance, Bruges sustained the more privileged echelons of society. At any rate, the
economic prosperity helped to bring wealth to the same city was able to capitalize politically on the dukes unex-
39
pected death by pledging its loyalty to his heir, Mary of

Burgundy, in return for the reinstatement of a series of
municipal privileges hitherto feared lost for ever.84 The
result was a new-found confidence on the part of both the
crafts and the citys most influential families, who appear
to have accounted for the majority of Memlings commissions around 1480. It was about this same time that Memlings career seems to have peaked economically.
Whatever the nature of the citys loyalty to Mary of Burgundy, it came to an abrupt end in 1482, when the governess of the Netherlands died suddenly. While her widower,
Archduke Maximilian, was confirmed as regent of most of
the Burgundian territories, Bruges and the other Flemish
cities were only prepared to recognize a regency council,
in conjunction with which Maximilian would govern as
guardian of his underage son, Philip the Fair. The dispute
sparked a drawn-out and increasingly bitter power struggle between the Flemish towns and the man who was to
become emperor, and it was to leave a decisive mark on
the history of the Southern Netherlands in the ensuing
decade.85 The prolonged conflict, which led in Bruges
to repeated armed rebellions against the archduke and to
fierce clashes between supporters of the pro-Habsburg
party and their opponents, had political and above all serious economic repercussions. Maximilian levied several
special taxes, for instance, and in 1484 and again in 1488,
he ordered foreign merchants to quit Bruges and to conduct their business from Antwerp instead; he blockaded
Bruges link with the sea and laid siege to the city several
times. It was not until 1491 three years before Memlings
death that Bruges finally submitted to Maximilian of
Habsburgs rule.86
During those unstable times, therefore, it was primarily
wealthy local families who commissioned altarpieces as
a public demonstration of their status, rank and prestige,
with their chapels in the citys churches as the backdrop.
Foreign merchants barely feature as patrons between
1484 and 1491. Memling, as we have seen, seems to have
responded to the shift in demand by producing more and
more standard compositions, speculating on their appeal
to prospective customers. The situation improved again
after 1491; part at least of the international merchant community returned to Bruges, and signs of a second cultural
flowering gradually began to emerge in the Burgundian
Netherlands. Memling, however, died too soon to witness much of this.
40
Borchert
fig.29
Memling
Triptych of the Passion
(Greverade Triptych), 1491,
detail: bystanders at the foot
of the cross of the Good Thief
Lbeck, St. Annen-Museum
fr Kunst und Kulturgeschichte
fig.30
Master of the St Lucy Legend
Altarpiece of the Black Heads
Tallinn, Niguliste Muuseum
It is appropriate that Memlings only documented commission the wings for the altarpiece of the Bruges book
illuminators guild representing Willem Vrelant and his
wife actually related to portraiture (see above). After
all, portraits be it full-length likenesses of donors or halflength portraits occupy a particularly prominent place
in the artists surviving oeuvre. Over thirty paintings, or
just under a third of all Memlings known works, can be
broadly characterized formally and in terms of content
as portraits in the modern sense. If we also count the nearlytwenty surviving full-length donor portraits that appear
in paintings attributed to Memling and his workshop, it

becomes plain that over half of his extant oeuvre features
portraits of one kind or another. Impressive as that figure
may be, it is still misleading in so far as several of Memlings paintings are actually fragments of larger ensembles,
some of which at least will originally have included portraits, too.
Memling was plainly the most successful portraitist of
his generation in the Burgundian Netherlands nowhere
near as many portraits survive by any of his contempo
raries. Not a single autonomous likeness, for instance,
41
hascome down to us from Hugo van der Goes, although

the handful of surviving donor figures (fig.31) and ancillary portraits (fig.32) that he incorporated in his panels testify to what must have been his outstanding achievement
in this area, too. Equally few portraits have survived from
Memlings immediate circle of minor Bruges masters
(fig.9); and while a variety of donor portraits have been
ascribed to Gerard David, who arrived in Bruges in 1484,
his surviving oeuvre otherwise includes just one lone portrait (fig.28).
Memlings success as a portraitist can be attributed to a
number of factors. As apprentice and assistant to Rogier
van der Weyden, he was able to familiarize himself with
his mentors portrait compositions and painting style
both half-lengths (fig.6) and full-length donors portraits.
We may also assume that, through Rogier, Memling will
have been aware of Robert Campins portraits (figs.45,
34) and those of other assistants working in Rogiers atelier
(fig.35). Memling continued to draw on Rogiers typology
in his own portraiture throughout the almost thirty years
of his professional career in Bruges. He took the scheme,
for instance, of the half-length portrait diptych and developed it into a variety of spatial formulas that were sufficiently flexible to meet his clients wishes. But that was not
the extent of Memlings borrowings from his teacher in
this regard; a work like Rogiers Braque Triptych (fig.38)
should also be seen as an indirect yet crucial precursor of
Memlings move towards the half-length portrait with
landscape background. Consequently, the view expressed
since Panofsky to the effect that Memlings landscape portraits ultimately derive from Italian models like Piero della
Francescas likenesses of Federigo da Montefeltro and
Battista Sforza (fig.65) plainly does not stand up.
In addition to Rogier, whose influence on Memlings
portraiture can barely be overstated, the artist had plentiful opportunity in Bruges to familiarize himself with
the refined portraits of Jan van Eyck. The illusionism that
Memling displays so emphatically in some of his portraits
the way he plays with reality using parapets and trompelil and imitation marble frames seemingly derives
directly from Van Eycks portraits (figs.7, 27, 36, 37). Certain aspects of the lighting, meanwhile, and of the way
he defines the pictorial space appear chiefly indebted to
the portraits of Petrus Christus (see figs.5153). As in his
religious compositions, Memling successfully blends the
achievements of Van der Weyden and Van Eyck in his
42
Borchert
fig.31
Hugo van der Goes
A Donor with St John the Baptist
Baltimore, Walters Art Museum,
Bequest of Henry Waters
fig.32
Hugo van der Goes
Monforte Altarpiece
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin,
Preussischer Kulturbesitz,
Gemldegalerie
portraiture to produce a style of his own that was plainly

appreciated by his clients.
The genius loci must also have contributed significantly to
Memlings extraordinary success as a portraitist: Bruges
was, after all, the ultimate cosmopolitan metropolis in
the Burgundian Netherlands. Members of the Italian
nationes above all the Genoese had been among Jan van
Eycks patrons as early as the 1430s, and thus played a decisive part in establishing the reputation of Flemish art in
southern Europe. The many foreigners based in or passing through Bruges also accounted for a significant pro-
portion of Petrus Christuss clients, not least as buyers of

portraits.
When Memling arrived in Bruges, he encountered substantial demand for portraits and was evidently quick
to meet his potential customers wishes. Despite this it
would probably be mistaken to conclude that the production of Memlings surviving portraits was spread evenly
across the years he was active in Bruges. Although the artist received portrait commissions throughout his career, a
substantial proportion of his surviving works the provenance of which often points to Italy seems to date from
43
fig.33
Virgin and Child;
Portrait of Philippede Cro
San Marino (Cal.), Huntington
Art Collections, The Art Gallery;
Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum
voorSchone Kunsten
44
Borchert
fig.35
Follower of Rogier van der Weyden
Portrait of a Man (Guillaume Fillastre?)
London, Courtauld Institute Gallery
fig.34
Robert Campin
Portrait of a Man (Robert de Masmines?)
Madrid, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza
45
fig.36
Jan van Eyck
Portrait of Margareta van Eyck, 1439
Groeningemuseum
the 1470s, with demand for portraits apparently waning

in subsequent years. The economic and political crisis that
engulfed Bruges by 1482 at the latest will undoubtedly
have contributed, as will the liquidation of Medici banking operations in northern Europe and England.
Representatives of other merchant communities Germans, Spaniards and Portuguese displayed nowhere
near as much interest in portraiture as the Italians had,
and would not begin to do so until after the turn of the
46
Borchert
century. For their part, members of influential local families were more interested in prestigious portraits in the
context of larger, high-profile altarpieces and were thus
no more able to plug the gap left by the Italians in terms
of demand for individual portraits. We are very fortunate, therefore, that a portrait painter as gifted as Memling should have arrived in fifteenth-century Bruges at a
moment where demand for portraits was at its zenith.
fig.37
Jan van Eyck
Portrait of a Man (Self-Portrait?), 1433
fig.38
Triptych of Jean Braque
1 Memling catalogue raisonns include Voll 1909; Friedlnder 1928

(1971); Faggin 1969; Lane 1980; De Vos 1994.
2 Weale 1861, 2028, 346, 459, 535; Weale 1871, 1834; Goetinck
and Ryckaert 1976, 495501; De Vos 1994, 40714; Janssens 1997,
6589.
3 Bock 1900, 152; Borchert 1994; De Vos 1994, 1573; Lorentz 1995a,
1720.
4 De Vos 1994, 3614; Lane 1997, 5370.
5 Parmentier, 1938, 63031; De Vos 1994, 21 and 407; Vandewalle
1997, 1924.
6 Strasser 1961, 97100; Jahn 1980, 4546; Groten 1993, 12; De Vos
1994, 407.
7 Dussart 1892, 49; Viaene 1963, 3046; Viaene 1976, 229;
Vandewalle 1997, 20.
8 Strasser 1961, 97100; Kther 1978; De Vos 1994, 414.
9 Schouteet 1989, 12; Blockmans 1995, 1120; Martens 1995, 434.
10 Schouteet 1989, 89.
11 Van Miegroet 1989, 215; Martens 1994b, 1819; Spronk 1998,
946.
12 Martens 1994, 1822; Martens 1997, 3541.
13 Schouteet 1989, 67 and 23647.
14 Schouteet 1989, 7; contrary view: De Vos 1994, 22.
15 De Vos 1994, 407, 41014; Ryckaert 1994, 1048; Janssens 1997,
6778.
16 Strohm 1990, 623; Martens 1992, 31519.
17 Vanden Haute 1913, 28 and 35; De Vos 1994, 41011.
18 Weale 1861, 212; Weale 1871, 2730; De Vos 1994, 41112; Janssens
1997, 778, 80.
19 Janssens 1997, 80.
20 Weale 1861, 356; De Vos 1994, 410.
21 De Vos 1994, 43.
22 Janssens 1997, 6670.
23 Schouteet 1955, 814.
24 Strohm 1990, 478; Martens 1992, 2326; Janssens 1997, 789.
25 Martens 1992, 236.
26 Martens 1992, 2334.
27 Martens 1994b, 16; Janssens 1997, 789, 879; Van der Velden
1997, 88110.
28 Ryckaert 1994, 1067.
29 Weale and Brockwell 1912, 19 (doc.30).
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
4
4
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
6 0
61
Strasser 1961, 97100; De Vos 1994, 414.

Devliegher 1964, 2326; Martens 1992, 7985.
Martens 1992, 80.
Martens 1992, 85 and 4848.
Martens 1992, 32730; De Vos 1994, 36 and 4089; Martens 1994,
16; Bousmanne 1997, 523.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, inv.17190.7; see also De Vos 1994,
304; Ainsworth 1994, 7980; New York 1998, 11214, no.10.
De Vos 1994, 21, 23 and 9093, no.5; Ainsworth 1994, 7881;
Copy: Venice, Galleria dellAccademia, inv.141; see also Bruges
1994, 246, no.97; Devliegher 1997, 313.
Geirnaert 19878, 17583; Geirnaert 1997, 2530.
Geirnaert 1992, 2468; Martens 1995, 489.
See De Vos 1999, nos.10, 13; Stroo et al. 1997, 13153.
Galassi 1999, 724; Ainsworth 2003, 30810; see, regarding
Vrancke, Koreny 2002, 67122; Koreny 2003, 26692.
De Vos 1994, no.4.
Biaostocki 1966, 8085; Lane 1991.
Warburg 1932, i, 187206, 20712; Nuttall 1992, 97112;
Rohlmann 1994, 4152; Nuttall 2004, 5460.
De Roover 1963, 3313 and 474 n.80.
De Roover 1963, 3313; McFarlane 1971, 112; Campbell 1998, 3813.
De Roover 1963, 475 n.92; Nuttall 2004, 579.
Biaostocki 1966; Borchert 1995b, 8083; Faries 1997, 24359.
See De Vos 1999, no.17.
See e.g. cat. 3, 13, 17.
Waldman 2001, 2833.
See De Vos 1994, no.11.
Smeyers 1997, 17694.
See De Vos 1999, nos.12, 22; Belting and Eichberger 1983, 16582.
See Lane 1997, 6170.
De Vos 1994, no.31.
Janssens de Bisthoven 1983, 2047; Koster 2002, 7982.
Lane 1997, 656.
Winkler 1965, 15565. Winkler erroneously attributes this type
toVan der Goes.
Ward 1971, 2735; Campbell 1998, 398400.
Geldhof 1976, 16974.
Duclos 1913, 3412; Esther 1976, 275; Martens 1992, 3529; Martens
1995b, 16975.
62 Weale 1871, 45; Lobelle-Caluw 1987, 445; Martens 1994, 1516;

Martens 1995b, 16970.
63 De Vos 1994, no.38; Martens 1994, 18.
64 De Vos 1994, no.35; New York 1998, no.11.
65 De Vos 1994, no.39; Campbell 1998, 37491.
66 De Vos 1994, no.32; Martens 1994, 1516.
67 De Vos 1994, no.13.
68 De Vos 1994, no.50; Belting and Kruse 1994, 2545.
69 De Vos 1994, no.37.
70 De Vos 1994, nos.53, 77, 89.
71 Demus, Klauner and Schtz 1981, 23840; De Vos 1994, 21516.
72 Rohlmann 1994, 6783; Campbell 1998, 3629; Nuttall 2004,
1234.
73 Dieric Bouts, The Pearl of Brabant (Munich, Alte Pinakothek,
waf 7678); see also Koreny 2002, 535.
74 Weale 1871, 47; McFarlane 1971, 31; De Vos 1994, no.86;
Lorentz 1995a, 3542; Borchert 1995b, 858.
75 Comblen-Sonkes and Lorentz 1995, 22062, here 25056.
76 See also Spronk et al., Early Netherlandish Diptychs (forthcoming).
77 De Vos 1994, no.83.
78 De Vos 1994, no.81; Borchert 1995a, passim; Borchert, in Bruges
1998, 2022.
79 Borchert 1993, 91100; De Vos 1994, no.90; Borchert 2002,
1445.
80 Hasse 1975, 37; Martens 1994, 29.
81 Borchert 1993, 99100; Borchert 2002, 1445.
82 See Martens 2000, 5882; most recently: Polli and Koppel 2004,
1317.
83 See Martens 1994b, 1822; Wilson 1998, 4184.
84 See Martens 1997, 37, graph 2.
85 Blockmans and Prevenier 1997, 195226.
86 Blockmans and Prevenier 1997, 22650; Wiesfleckner 1971,
22447.
47

Hans Memling Life and Work

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MC_01

detail groter inscannen

Memling Life and Work

Memling Life and Work

birthplace cannot be identified any more specifically.9 All

Memling Life and Work

maternal inheritance, which was estimated at the time at

Memling Life and Work

from this that Memlings financial situation like that

Memling Life and Work

not only religious motives that drew the painters to join

One plausible explanation is that Memling was able to

Memling Life and Work

ifferent collections; the original configuration is known,

Memling Life and Work

Another commission that Hans Memling received in the

Memling Life and Work

Memling Life and Work

wishes. Memling certainly made far-reaching changes to

available to at least a limited extent for public viewing

Memling Life and Work

ground, established its lasting popularity first in Bruges

institutions had ordered a painting from Memling must

Memling Life and Work

examine the hospitals finances and the city given a say in

have been the hospitals friars and nuns themselves who

cial management post at the hospital or belonged to its

bers of the hospital community kneel facing one another,

Memling Life and Work

altarpiece in its original position will immediately have

now began to commission altarpieces from him for their

(1479) on the frame is the Adoration of the Kings which, the

and Veronica sitting in front of a landscape that stretches

Memling Life and Work

which the patrons initials if have been painted in the

triptych is one of the earliest examples of the family group

Memling Life and Work

by no means be considered secure.74 Although the context

Memling Life and Work

of multiple panels on the theme of the Assumption and

pleted, as the Hanseatic merchants who left Bruges in 1488

city; when, for instance, the Confraternity of the Black

Italian merchants and financiers, influential local families

Memling Life and Work

pected death by pledging its loyalty to his heir, Mary of

in paintings attributed to Memling and his workshop, it

Memling Life and Work

hascome down to us from Hugo van der Goes, although

portraiture to produce a style of his own that was plainly

portion of Petrus Christuss clients, not least as buyers of

Memling Life and Work

Memling Life and Work

the 1470s, with demand for portraits apparently waning

1 Memling catalogue raisonns include Voll 1909; Friedlnder 1928

Strasser 1961, 97100; De Vos 1994, 414.

62 Weale 1871, 45; Lobelle-Caluw 1987, 445; Martens 1994, 1516;

Memling Life and Work

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