As far as we know, The Ghent Altarpiece was painted by Jan Van Eyck, though some say that it was his brother Hubert who was the true painter of this masterpiece. What we do know for sure is the fact that the debatable nature of the identity of its painter remains the least chaotic detail in the history of this painting.
The Ghent Altarpiece, also known as ‘The Adoration of The Mystic Lamb’ was one of the first pieces to put oil paints to use. Due to its meticulous detail and lifelike portraits, it is known to be one of the pioneers of the art form known as realism.
Murphy’s law states that "anything that can go wrong will go wrong" and that is just about what happened. It survived being robbed, it survived being burnt, it survived being cut in half, raided, forged and dismantled. The Ghent Altarpiece has a truly topsy-turvy history.
The mystery of the theft of one half of the panel remains unsolved since 1934 when one of the twelve panels was stolen. One half of the panel was returned but the other half has been missing for the past eight decades. To this day, the search for this half continues. This wasn’t the first time this panel was stolen and it certainly wasn’t the last.
In 1794, Napoleon robbed four panels of this painting. The Ghent Altarpiece was one of Adolf Hitler’s most desired pieces of artwork for his grand museum and was hidden, along with numerous stolen art pieces in an Australian salt
mine which was intended to be blown up, the painting however survived.
The anecdotes of this painting are not just limited to robberies and theft, the painting was also lucky enough to survive the crackling flames of fire on two separate occasions.
The Ghent Altarpiece has managed to narrowly escape on several instants and has been safely restored and is currently on display at Saint Bavo Cathedral in Ghent, Belgium. From the convoluted history and the hairbreadth escapes associated with this painting, we can say that we are lucky to still have it.
Comments