Annunciation (Memling)

The Annunciation is an oil painting by the Early Netherlandish

painter Hans Memling. It depicts the Annunciation, the archangel
Gabriel's announcement to the Virgin Mary that she would
conceive and become the mother of Jesus, described in the Gospel
of Luke (Luke 1:26). The painting was executed in the 1480s and
was transferred to canvas from its original oak panel sometime
after 1928; it is today held in the Robert Lehman collection of the
Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

The panel shows Mary in a domestic interior with two attendant

angels. Gabriel is dressed in ecclesiastical robes, while a dove
hovers above Mary, representing the Holy Spirit. It expands upon
the Annunciation wing of Rogier van der Weyden's Saint
Columba Altarpiece of c. 1455. According to the art historian
Maryan Ainsworth, the work is a "startlingly original image, rich
in connotations for the viewer or worshiper".[1]

The iconography focuses on the Virgin's purity. Her swoon

foreshadows the Crucifixion of Jesus, and the panel emphasizes
her role as mother, bride, and Queen of Heaven. The original
frame survived until the 19th century and was inscribed with a
date believed to be 1482; modern art historians have suggested
that the number's final digit was a 9, which would give a date of
The Annunciation, 76.5 × 54.6 cm (301⁄8 ×
1489. In 1847 the art historian Gustav Friedrich Waagen
211⁄2 in.), Hans Memling, 1480s, oil on panel
described the panel as one of Memling's "finest and most original
(transferred to canvas), Metropolitan Museum of
works".[2] In 1902, it was exhibited in Bruges at the Exposition
Art, New York
des primitifs flamands à Bruges, after which it underwent
cleaning and restoration. The banker Philip Lehman bought it in
1920 from the Radziwiłł family, in whose collection it might have been since the 16th century; Antoni Radziwiłł
discovered it on a family estate in the early 19th century. At that time, it had been pierced through with an arrow
and required restoration.

Description

Subject

The Annunciation was a popular theme in European art,[3] although a difficult scene to paint, because it depicts
Mary's union with Christ as she becomes the tabernacle for the Word made flesh. The doctrine of Mary as
Theotokos, the God-bearer, was affirmed in 431 at the Council of Ephesus; two decades later the Council of
Chalcedon affirmed the doctrine of Incarnation – that Christ was of two natures (God and Man) – and Mary's
perpetual virginity was affirmed at the Lateran Council of 631. In Byzantine art, Annunciation scenes depict the
Virgin enthroned and dressed in royal regalia.[4] In later centuries she was shown in enclosed spaces: the temple,
the church, the garden.[5]
 In Early Netherlandish art the Annunciation
is typically set in contemporary domestic
interiors, a motif and tradition established
by Robert Campin, and followed by Jan van
Eyck and Rogier van der Weyden.[1] Neither
Campin nor van Eyck went so far as to set
the scene in a bedchamber,[4] although the
motif is found in van der Weyden's Louvre
Annunciation of c. 1435 and his Saint
Columba Altarpiece of c. 1455, in which the
Virgin kneels by the nuptial bed, rendered in
red made from costly pigments.[6]
Memling's depiction of the scene is nearly
identical to that in the Saint Columba Robert Campin's c. 1420s Mérode
Altarpiece.[7] Altarpiece, (The Cloisters), with
conventional iconography of a hearth
and a vase of flowers
Figures

The archangel Gabriel appears before Mary to announce that she will bear the Son
Left panel of Rogier van der
of God.[8] He is shown standing in a three-quarter view,[9] wearing a small jeweled
Weyden's Saint Columba
diadem and dressed in vestments. He has a richly embroidered red-and-gold
altarpiece, c. 1455, Alte
brocade cope, edged with a pattern of gray seraphim and wheels, over a white alb
Pinakothek, Munich. Rays of
and amice. He holds his staff of office in one hand, and raises the other towards
light stream through the open
window toward the Virgin.
the Virgin.[10] He bends his knees, honoring and acknowledging her as Mother of
Christ and Queen of Heaven,[1] and his feet are bare and positioned slightly behind
hers.[11]

The Virgin is in a frontal view;[9] directly behind her the red-curtained bed acts as a framing device, similar to
the traditional canopy of honor or baldachin.[6] Unlike in the work of Memling's predecessors, whose Virgins are
garbed in heavily jeweled and costly robes, the plain white shift she wears beneath a blue mantle is minimally
jeweled at the hem and at the open neckline. A purple underdress peeks out at her neck and wrists, indicating
her royal status.[5] Mary seems neither surprised nor fearful at the announcement; according to Blum the scene
is rendered with a great sense of naturalism and successfully depicts "the transformation of Mary from girl to
God-bearer".[11]

The Virgin holds an innovative and unusual position. She seems to be either rising or swooning as if having lost
her balance, a divergence from her conventional seated or kneeling pose. Blum believes "one may search in vain
in other Netherlandish Annunciation panels of the fifteenth century of a Virgin positioned as she is here".[6] The
art historian Penny Jolly suggests that the painting shows a birthing position, a motif with which van der
Weyden experimented in his Seven Sacraments Altarpiece, where the Virgin's collapse results in a childbirth-
like posture, and in his Descent from the Cross, which has Mary Magdalene bending and crouching – similar to
the position Memling's Magdalene assumes in his Lamentation.[12] Flanking the Virgin, and holding her, are two
attendant angels. The one to the left lifts the Virgin's robe while the other gazes at the viewer, "soliciting our
response", according to Ainsworth.[1] Both are small-statured, solemn, and, according to Blum, in mood
"comparable to that of Gabriel".[13] Other than the presence of the angels, Memling shows a typical upper-
merchant-class 15th-century Flemish bedchamber.[4]

Objects

A dove, representing the Holy Spirit, hovers inside a rainbow-hued circle of light directly above the Virgin's
head. Its placement and size are unusual for art of the period. It is unlike anything found in van der Weyden, and
is never repeated in Memling's work, but reminiscent of van Eyck's dove in the Ghent Altarpiece's Annunciation
panel.[10] Its shape is found in medallions hung above beds at that time, and
thus seems in keeping with the domestic interior.[4] Mary's left hand rests on
an open prayer book, which she has propped open on a prie-dieu, with the
letter "D" visible – perhaps for Deus tecum ("the Lord be with you"),
according to Ainsworth.[1] Blum speculates that the passage is from Isaiah
7:14, "Behold a Virgin shall conceive and bear a son".[11] A vase containing
white lilies and a single blue iris is next to it on the floor.[14]

A curtain sack, commonly found on beds of the period, hangs in the central
axis between Gabriel and the attendant angel.[15] A sideboard beside the bed
contains two types of candles and a flask of water standing in bright light
falling from the window to the left.[1] The floor is multi-colored tile-work,
similar to that in van der Weyden's Saint Columba Altarpiece; Memling
truncates the ceiling rafters in the mid-ground, at the end of the bed, with the
floor extending into the foreground. Blum describes the effect as acting "like
an open stage for the holy figures".[9]

Iconography
The iconography is not overly labored, and Memling avoids extraneous Jan van Eyck's Annunciation, from
symbolism.[11] Many elements emphasize Mary's role as the Mother of God; the 1432 Ghent Altarpiece, has an
the chamber is furnished with simple everyday objects that indicate her inscription streaming towards the
purity. The vase of lilies and the items on the sideboard are objects 15th- Virgin and the dove of the Holy
century viewers would have associated with her.[8] White lilies were often Spirit hovers above.
used to signify her purity, while irises or sword lilies were used as metaphors
for her suffering.[14] Memling emphasizes symbols associated with her womb
and virginity, "introduces two additional angelic priests, and floods the room with natural light, thereby
rearranging the anecdotal to emphasize the doctrinal meaning".[11] Charles Sterling describes the work as "one of
the finest examples of Memling's ability to take a pictorial convention inherited from his predecessors and infuse
it with a heightened sense of emotion and narrative complexity".[16]

Light

From the 9th century Light became associated with Mary and the
Incarnation. Millard Meiss notes that from the 12th century a common
way to convey the conception was to compare light passing through
glass to the passage of the Holy Spirit through the body of the
Virgin.[17] Saint Bernard likened it to sunshine, explaining in this
passage: "Just as the brilliance of the sun fills and penetrates a glass
window without damaging it, and pierces its solid form with
imperceptible subtlety, neither hurting when entering nor destroying
when emerging; thus the word of God, the splendor of the Father,
entered the virgin chamber and then came forth from the closed
womb."[18]

Three objects on the bedside cabinet represent the Virgin's purity: the
water flask, the candleholder, and the ropewick light. The light passing Detail showing the light shining on the
through the glass of the womb-shaped flask symbolizes her flesh, sideboard, a flask of clear water, a
pierced by divine light;[19] its clear and undisturbed water represents ropewick light, a candlestick, and a curtain-
her purity at the moment of conception,[1] a device found also in the sack
earlier paintings as a metaphor of the Virgin's sanctity.[20] The flask shows a reflection of the window's crossbar
as a cross, a symbol of the Crucifixion – another small detail in which Memling "lays one translucent symbolic
form upon another".[19]

Light represented by candles was then often used to symbolise the Virgin and
Christ; both Campin and van Eyck placed hearths or candles in their
annunciation scenes.[20] The candleholder without a candle and the ropewick
without flame symbolize the world before Christ's Nativity and the presence
of his divine light, according to Ainsworth.[1]

The challenge for painters of the Annunciation was how to visually represent
the Incarnation, the Word made flesh, or Logos.[21] They often showed rays
of light emanating from Gabriel or a nearby window entering Mary's body to
depict the concept of Christ "who inhabited and passed through her body".
The light rays might sometimes include an inscription,[19] and were
sometimes shown entering her ear, in the belief that it was thus the Word
became flesh.[22]

Memling did not depict the light as distinct rays, nor had Dieric Bouts's Getty
Dieric Bouts's Annunciation,
Annunciation. Yet the room is bright, filled with sunlight, a fenestra
c. 1450s, Getty Center, Los
incarnationis, which would have been an adequate symbol for the
Angeles, omits rays of light.
contemporary viewer.[23] By the mid-15th century the Virgin is found
depicted in a room or chamber near an open window to permit the passage of
light.[22] Memling's room, with its window through which light streams, is a most "decorous sign of Mary's
chastity", according to Blum.[23] There are no word scrolls or banderoles to indicate the Virgin's acceptance, yet
her consent is obvious through her pose, which seems, according to Sterling, both submissive and active.[24]

Mother of Christ

The Virgin birth is indicated by the red bed and red womb-shaped curtain-
sack. During the early 15th century hanging beds or curtain-sacks became
symbols of the Incarnation, and "served to affirm [Christ's] humanity". Blum
notes that at a time "when artists did not hesitate to depict the breast of the
Virgin, Memling did not shun her womb".[15] Christ's humanity was a source
of fascination, and it was only in Netherlandish art that a solution was found
for visualizing his embryonic state with curtain-sacks draped to suggest the
shape of a womb.[25]

Mary's body becomes the tabernacle holding the Host made flesh.[10] She
becomes an object of devotion, a "monstrance containing the Host".[1] Her
full belly and the presence of the dove indicate that the moment of
Incarnation has occurred. Viewers would have been reminded of the
Crucifixion and Lamentation with the swoon, "thus anticipating Christ's
sacrifice for the salvation of mankind at the moment of his conception".[1]
According to theologians, Mary stood with dignity at the Crucifixion of Jesus,
but in 15th-century art she is depicted swooning, according to Jolly, "in
The Boucicaut Master's "Visitation"
agony at the sight of her dying son ... assuming the pose of a mother in the
(c. 1405) is a rare example of Mary
throes of the pain of childbirth". At the cross she felt the pain of his death,
with attendant angels who touch her
garments.
pain which at his birth she had not experienced.[12]

The painting's domestic setting belies its liturgical meaning. The dove is a
reminder of the Eucharist and Mass. Lotte Brand Philip observes how throughout the 15th century "eucharistic
vessels made in the form of doves and suspended over altars ... were lowered at the moment of
transubstantiation"; here it suggests that in the same way the Holy Spirit
gives life to the bread and wine, it gave life to the Virgin's womb.[10] She
carries the Body and Blood of Christ, and is attended by three priestly
angels.[10] Mary's function is to bear "the Savior of the World"; the angels'
role is to "support, present and protect her sacred being".[5] With the birth of
Christ her "miraculous womb passed its final test" to become an object of
veneration.[4]

Bride of Christ

Memling presents the Virgin as the Bride of Christ about to assume her role
as Queen of Heaven, with attendant angels indicating her royal status.[24]
Angels of this kind are usually shown hovering above the Virgin, holding her
crown, and some German painters showed them hovering close in
Annunciation scenes, but angels rarely approach or touch the Virgin.[26] Only
a single previous version of such attendant angels has been found: in the
Boucicaut Master's early 15th-century illuminated manuscript version of the
"Visitation", the pregnant Virgin's long mantle is held by attendant angels,
about which Blum notes that "her queenly appearance surely commemorates
the moment when Mary is first addressed as Theotokos, the Mother of the Stefan Lochner, The Virgin Crowned
Lord".[5] Memling often depicted pairs of angels dressed in vestments by Angels, c. 1450, Cleveland
attending the Virgin, but these two, dressed in simple amices and albs, were Museum of Art, depicts the Virgin as
never repeated in his art. Their dual function is to "present the eucharistic Queen of Heaven with two barely
offering and proclaim the Virgin bride and queen".[5] visible attendant angels hovering
above her crown.

Style and influence

The Annunciation draws heavily on van der Weyden's Louvre Annunciation
(1430s), his Saint Columba Altarpiece (c. 1455), and the Clugny
Annunciation (c. 1465–1475), which is attributed either to van der Weyden
or to Memling.[1] Memling almost certainly was apprenticed to van der
Weyden in Brussels until he set up his own workshop in Bruges sometime
after 1465.[27] Memling's Annunciation is more innovative, with motifs such
as the attendant angels that were absent in the earlier paintings.[1] According
to Till-Holger Borchert, not only was Memling familiar with van der
Weyden's motifs and compositions, but he might have assisted with the
underdrawing in van der Weyden's workshop.[27] The shutters on the right
are copied from the Louvre panel, and the knotted curtain appears in the
Saint Columba triptych's "Annunciation".[6]

A sense of movement is conveyed throughout. The trailing edges of Gabriel's

Clugny Annunciation, c. 1465–1475,
Workshop of Rogier van der
Weyden or by Hans Memling,
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New
York
garment fall outside the pictorial space, indicating his arrival. The Virgin's
"serpentine" pose, with attendant angels supporting her, adds to the sense of
flow.[16] Memling's use of color achieves a startling effect. The traditional
rays of light are replaced with light color indicators; the white clothes
rendered in "icy" blue, the angel to the right in yellow patches seems
"bleached by light", and the left-hand angel appears to be steeped in shadow,
dressed in clothes of lavender and bearing deep green wings. The effect is
iridescent, according to Blum, who writes, "this shimmering surface gives
[the figures] an unearthly quality, separating them from the more believable
world of the bedchamber".[9] The effect deviates from the pure naturalism and realism which typifies Early
Netherlandish art, causing a "startling" juxtaposition, an effect that is "unsteadying" and contradictory.[28]

Scholars have not established whether the panel was meant to be a

single devotional work, or part of a larger, and now broken up,
polyptych. According to Ainsworth, its size and "the sacramental nature
of its subject would have been appropriate for a family chapel in a
church or monastery for the chapel of a guild corporation".[1] An intact,
inscribed frame is unusual for a wing panel, indicating that it was
probably intended as a single piece,[2] but scholars are unsure because
the slight left-to-right axis of the tiles suggests that it could have been
the left-hand wing of a larger piece.[16] There is no information about
the panel's reverse, which has not survived.[2]

Technical analysis shows extensive underdrawing, typical for Memling.

This was completed in a dry medium, except for the dove and the flask
and candles on the sideboard. Revisions during the final painting Center panel, Annunciation Triptych,
included the enlargement of the Virgin's sleeves and the repositioning Rogier van der Weyden, c. 1430s, Louvre,
of Gabriel's staff. Incisions were made to indicate the floor tiles and the Paris
dove's position.[29]

The only person to question Gustav Friedrich Waagen's 1847 attribution to Memling is W. H. J. Weale, who in
1903 declared that Memling "would never have dreamt of introducing into the representation of this mystery
these two sentimental and affected angels".[30]

Provenance and condition

The painting's known provenance begins in the 1830s when it was in the possession of the Radziwiłł family.[1]
According to the art historian Sulpiz Boisserée, who saw the painting in 1832, Antoni Radziwiłł found the
painting in an estate his father owned. Waagen speculated that may have belonged to Mikołaj Radziwiłł (1549–
1616), who might have inherited it from his brother Jerzy Radziwiłł (1556–1600), who was a cardinal.[31] The
family kept it until 1920 when Princess Radziwiłł sold it to the Duveen Brothers in Paris.[1] The American
investment banker Philip Lehman bought it in October 1920; it is now held in the Robert Lehman collection at
the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York.[1]

Generally the condition is good. Memling painted the work on two panels of about 28 cm each. The dated and
inscribed frame, probably the original, was discarded in 1830.[29] There have been three documented
restorations. The painting had been pierced by an arrow when Antoni Radziwiłł found it; he had it restored and
the damage repaired. At that time the Virgin's mantle and the flesh tones sustained heavy overpainting. The
original frame was discarded, but its inscription was inserted into the new frame.[24] A description of the original
frame suggests that it bore a coat of arms, perhaps belonging to Jerzy Radziwiłł.[31] The second restoration was
after its exhibition in Bruges in 1902, and the third when Lehman had it restored and transferred to canvas
sometime after 1928. The painting survived the transfer without significant damage. A late 19th-century
photograph shows wood on all four sides of the painted surface, which suggests that the edges may have been
extended during the transfer. Areas that suffered paint loss and overpainting are Gabriel's cope and the vase
holding the flowers.[29]

When Boisserée saw the painting he recorded the inscription's date as 1480. The last digit of the inscription was
faded and difficult to read and had become illegible by 1899. Waagen suggested that the date could have been
1482, and the art historian Dirk de Vos suggested 1489.[2] Memling's style does not lend itself well to assigning
dates, making a determination difficult. According to Sterling, an earlier date is easily accepted, especially
because of stylistic similarities to Memling's 1479 St John Altarpiece,[2] whereas Ainsworth leans toward the
later date as more in keeping with the mature style of the late 1480s.[1]

References
1. Ainsworth (1998), 118
2. Sterling (1998), 81
3. "The Annunciation" (http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-collection-online/search/437490). Metropolitan
Museum of Art. Retrieved April 28, 2015.
4. Blum (1992), 52
5. Blum (1992), 53
6. Blum (1992), 43
7. Snyder (1987), 38
8. Howard (2000), 353
9. Blum (1992), 55
10. Blum (1992), 49
11. Blum (1992), 50
12. Jolly (2014), 40, 57
13. Blum (1992), 54
14. Blum (1992), 48
15. Blum (1992), 44
16. Sterling (1998), 80
17. Meiss (1945), 177
18. Meiss (1945), 176
19. Blum (1992), 46
20. Meiss (1945), 175
21. Koslow (1989), 10
22. Meiss (1945), 178
23. Blum (1992), 47
24. Sterling (1998), 83
25. Koslow (1989), 11–12
26. Sterling (1998), 82
27. Borchert (2008), 87
28. Blum (1992), 56
29. Sterling (1998), 78
30. Weale (1903), 35
31. Sterling (1998), 84

Sources
Ainsworth, Maryan. "Hans Memling: The Annunciation". In: From Van Eyck to Bruegel: Early Netherlandish
Painting in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1998. ISBN 978-0-
87099-870-6
Baynes, T. S., ed. (1878), "Annunciation" (https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Encyclop%C3%A6dia_Britannica,_
Ninth_Edition/Annunciation), Encyclopædia Britannica, vol. 2 (9th ed.), New York: Charles Scribner's Sons,
p. 90
 Blum, Shirley Neilsen. "Hans Memling's 'Annunciation' with Angelic Attendants". Metropolitan Museum of Art
Journal. Vol. 27, 1992. 43–58
Borchert, Till-Holger. "Hans Memling and Rogier van der Weyden". In: J. Chapuis (ed), Invention: Northern
Renaissance Studies in honor of Molly Faries. Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2008. ISBN 978-2-503-52768-0
Howard, Kathleen (ed). The Metropolitan Museum of Art Guide. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art,
2000. ISBN 978-0-87099-711-2
Jolly, Penny Howell. Picturing the 'Pregnant' Magdalene in Northern Art, 1430–1550: Addressing and
Undressing the Sinner-Saint. Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2014. ISBN 978-1-4724-1495-3
Koslow, Susan. "The Curtain-Sack: A Newly Discovered Incarnation Motif in Rogier van der Weyden's
'Columba Annunciation'". Artibus et Historiae. Vol. 7, No. 13, 1986. 9–33
Meiss, Millard. "Light as Form and Symbol in Some Fifteenth-Century Paintings". The Art Bulletin, Vol. 27,
No. 3, 1945. 175–181
Snyder, James (ed). The Renaissance in the North. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1987. ISBN 978-
0-87099-434-0
Sterling, Charles. Fifteenth- to Eighteenth-century European Paintings in the Robert Lehman Collection. New
York: Metropolitan Museum of Art with Princeton University Press, 1998. ISBN 978-0-691-00698-7
Weale, James W. H. "The Early Painters of the Netherlands as Illustrated by the Bruges Exhibition of 1902".
The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs. Vol. 2, No. 4, 1903. 174–175, 177

External links
Metropolitan Museum of Art, Memling's The Annunciation (http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-collectio
n-online/search/459055)

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