The Crucifixion; The Last Judgment - Jan van Eyck

This Flemish painting, The Crucifixion; The Last Judgment by Jan van Eyck and his Workshop Assistant was created in 1430, also known as the early Renaissance Period. It is on exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in Fifth Avenue, New York City. Both The Crucifixion and The Last Judgment were done in two separate panels juxtapositionally, which seem to be the wings of a triptych altarpiece since both panels have the hinge gaps toward the middle, however the middle piece seems to be missing. Each of them measures 22’1/4” x 7’1/3” inches and were painted using oil on canvas, transferred from wood. Most of the work were done by Jan van Eyck except the upper part of The Judgment Day, done by his assistant. This painting is one of the few The Last Judgment during that period, however unique. This is easily classified as period art. There is no doubt that this painting did a really good job on using three of these formal elements of art: line, color and space. The upper of The Last Judgment; which done by Jan van Eyck’s assistant; shows a formal element of art that Jan van Eyck doesn’t, scale. Both painting were break up into many sections and Jan van Eyck and his assistant show different techniques in each section.
In The Crucifixion, Jan van Eyck used a lot of contour lines to trace out every one’s emotion. From Christ’s face we can see he is in extremely pain and nearly dead situation, while the spear stabbed into his side. On the other hand, there are people and soldiers wondering, cheering, praying and arguing underneath the three crucified men. We also can tell that the person in purple is Virgin Mary, who is weeping and surrounded by two sisters and John the Baptist, very much sorrowful to see her son being crucified. The bottom part of The Last Judgment is consider as hell. From the painting we can tell the people were eaten, torn, and tortured by all sort of creatures. Every single creatures in the painting is different. They look odd and very unusual from what we’ve known in the modern period. Such as a man was eaten by a stomach, a rat face with bear-like body, and some phoenix-like flying creatures. Jan van Eyck shows the same technique as in The Crucifixion; highly detailed, which is also a characteristic of Northern Renaissance. However; the upper part of The Last Judgment, done by Jan van Eyck’s assistant, didn’t show much of the characteristic of the Northern Renaissance. All the figures are very stiff and emotionless.
Christ and an guardian angel in The Last Judgment created an invisible vertical line, as Christ is the judge on the top and the angel is guarding the underworld. Unlike other Last Judgment; which has a dexter and a sinister side; Jan van Eyck’s was organized hierarchically in three tiers, heaven, earth, and hell. Other than contour and vertical line, there are many symbolic features in this painting. If the head of Christ and two other crucified men in The Crucifixion connect together; it will form a triangular shape; which is a Catholic symbolism, Father, Son, and Holy Trinity. Additionally, Christ, Mary, and John the Baptist; the guardian angel and the skeleton’s hands in The Last Judgment; formed implied lines and connected into 2 individual triangular shapes. This characteristic can only be found in Northern Renaissance arts.
The uses of colors in The Crucifixion are leaning against warm color; red and yellow, somehow orange(ish). Everything on the ground; the people, the horses, the buildings, the armors, and the dirt are very orange-ish. It gives the viewers a sense of the hot weather there, also the feel of blood and doomsday. Jan van Eyck used mostly orange and black in the hell of The Last Judgment definitely make the atmosphere of hell looks more intense. People are either being saved and go to heaven or go to hell to suffer because of their sins. The painting shows there are two ways of death, drown to dead in the sea or burn to dead on the ground, then enter the hell through the skeleton. Because the color of the upper part of The Last Judgment is so rich and the color of hell is so dull, it seems there is no light comes in from outside the hell and it is completely isolated from outside the world. The angels on the top of The Last Judgment have beautiful wings, however, the color saturated into red in the middle. Figures and objects in The Crucifixion and The Last Judgment are kind of orange-ish, this is just right to compliment with the blue sky. Speaking of blue sky, the mountains in The Crucifixion were painted in blue and the color of the mountain gets lighter when it gets farther.
The most remarkable part of The Crucifixion is the amazing depth of the scene behind the three crosses. Although the vanishing point are block by Christ, we can see the relationship between the people and in the foreground and the beautiful landscape at the background. Both the people and the landscape creates an atmosphere perspective. Two crucified men on the side of the Christ created two diagonal lines in the picture space to show the perspective line. On the other hand; the people in the middle ground and foreground are using different perspective technique, which is the overlapping perspective technique. This gives us a sense that the viewer is the witness. The assistant also shows us a little perspective at upper part of The Last Judgment. We see the followers on both sides, which is slightly bigger figure; to the middle, slightly smaller figures. However, the bottom part of The Last Judgment doesn’t show any perspective at all. It is just very flat. These perspective technique only can be found during the Renaissance period but not the Middle Ages.
Although both painting were done by using the early Renaissance technique; Jan van Eyck’s assistant also shows us something which is not belong to this painting, the scale. Like many paintings in the Middle Ages, the saints always have bigger figure. Comparing the size of figure of the followers to Mary, Christ, and John the Baptist, we still see the hierarchy composition exist in this painting.
Jan van Eyck’s The Crucifixion and The Last Judgment are two powerful and moving pieces with symbolism and hidden meanings. Its theme and subject matter is unique because many techniques were put into one painting (such as two kinds of perspective were created in The Crucifixion; the perspective heaven and the non-perspective hell). Another thing which make this pieces unique is breaking the typical Last Judgment. Usually we will see the hell is on Christ’s left but not under. Jan van Eyck’s choice of a subject is commendable and I wish that many more artists would be inspired to paint such scenes from our history. It is important for everyone to be more familiar with our culture, our history, and to be proud of it. Indeed, when I walked the entire length of the Jan van Eyck Gallery, this painting was the only one that stopped me in my tracks and arrested my attention. I immediately noticed that this painting were done by two different artists even I did not look at the description. First, they were being separated into many sections; then, the choice of colors of the upper part of The Last Judgment seems to be cleaner and bright. Although that day my time did not allow me to spend more time on this painting, I spent more than one hour by looking at this painting in my computer and dissecting them into pieces. Jan van Eyck is truly a maestro who has created not just one, but many, masterpieces. No wonder he was considered one of the best Northern European painter in the 15th century.