February Art: ships & skies
This might be my new favourite painting. Horizon! Hand-gestures! Hats! There’s so much going on. Well, this is not just anyone but King Melchior Sailing to the Holy Land (c.1450) with luggage, retinue, flotilla, in a pretty elaborate embarkation.
In a way, the process had to be so elaborate, and not only because he was a King. When through Muslim incursions the Holy Land was cut off to pilgrims, to demonstrate your devotion you had to visit sites closer to home. The ready use of proper sailing vessels in the time of Christ explained why St Mark had handily turned up in Venice, St Mary Magdelene had sailed to the south of France (her bones lifted to the Cathedral at Vézelay), and St James had somehow travelled all the way to Compostela, Spain to help with the Crusades. But though it is fun to spot the tonsured rowing monks, crow’s nests, Norman crenelations, and other potential anachronisms, it is more fun still to feast on this incised jewel of painting (one of an altar piece pair) from a Florentine artist with gift for colour as well as line; the changing light in the sky, multicoloured robes, the glorious reds and yellows of the tents picked up by the dog collar. Pesellino died young of the plague, leaving behind only a handful of works; his colours maybe owe something to restoration. But it means there’s no better time to see them. The painting is on view right now until March in a tiny exhibition in the National Gallery, London; just one room, but a what a room.
thebicyclops 