The Arnolfini Portrait

What makes the Arnolfini Portrait os interesting? Sure, Van Eyck is very skillful and this painting is a great display of craftsmanship, but why is it so important in art history? What even is it?

[adamodeo]

The Arnolfini Portrait is captivating beyond just it beauty - it seems that the man is saying goodbye to the woman with his right hand held up as if say -"you must go" yet his left hand is holding hers as part of him doesn't wish her to leave,

[morland]

The Mona Lisa did not become, "historically significant" to the general population until it was stolen in 1911 and before that it took over 200yrs before the art world considered it a masterpiece. (According to a Vox video about Mona Lisa being overrated) This suggests that subjectivity plays a factor. To me Arnolfini’s wedding-WOW it is fantastic. The veins on the hands, the reflection of the curved mirror, the little painting in the mirror, the details of the rug, the dust on the wooden floor, the stained glass and the fact that the wall on the other side of it visible, the hundreds of dog hairs, the alien shoes, his weird hat, her weird hairstyle, details of the wooden statues. The devotion he gave to this work is inspiring in countless ways. FYI I had underestimated it on at least three occasions while looking at it through my computer over the years. I even missed seeing it in person when I visited the National Art gallery in London two years ago. It wasn't until I saw it today on my computer in the USA that I finally see why many people consider it iconic.

[barbaravoss]

I enjoy it as a window into another age, their idea of opulence, extravagance and domesticity. I love the gentle way the hands of the couple connect. I love the mystery of the painting. The detailed textures are a feast for the eye which I also appreciate. Those were great achievements of another age.

[ernestozarate]

What I've always found compelling about the Arnolfini Portrait is the place it holds as one of the earliest examples of representational autorship. If the man in the reflection can, in fact, be believed to be Van Eyck (as the signature does suggest) then what we have here is essentially a painting referencing itself and its own creative process, its own "becoming" in Deleuzian terms. This blurs the line between representation and reality in a way that was seldom explored again until Velazquez's Las Meninas and much later on as the basis of postmodernism.

[vanjababic]

One of the most important paintings in art history. Period.

[pia]

I like it BECAUSE we don't know the narrative behind it. It's so enigmatic and mysterious. The mere addition of the mirror invites us to look at the painting as a narrative. Who are the two figures? Why are there items strewn about? Why are they wearing fur during the spring? There are so many questions!!

[harjooni]

I've always thought most of the historical significance comes from the fact that you couldn't have Las Meninas without this one.

[AlfredoSábat-dj]

This may seem like "retinal art", but to me, it's much, much more. This painting is captivating for all its details and mistery, yes, but there is one detail that tops everything: the mirror at the back. First you see the people at the front, their clothes, their dog, their furniture, and suddenly you realize, hey, that's a mirror, there's someone looking at me on that reflection, that means that must be me, the person looking at this scene, and I am in 1434, in Bruges, standing next to Jan Van Eyck, who was there, as the writing on the wall states it. "I was here, I am here, and so are you". This painting is a time machine.

[Ronniecoltrane]

You said she died in 1933... it would have been 1433

[WhiteBloggerBlackSpecs]

Look at the composition nothing short of masterful

[geertdecoster]

The haunting face of the widower, his black clothes and the positioning of his hands. That makes the picture.

[urugozo]

So many elements make this a compelling painting. On top of what you already mentioned. The clothes for one are something I have not seen anywhere else. That incredibly large hat that he carries with such dignity, the striking green dress on her and the audacity of combining it with another very pigmented blue. I have many times wondered what her hair looks like, she seems to have horns, I can't unsee it. Then after so much pomp she seems to have a simple embroidered napkin thrown over her head, is it a veil? It feels so weird because it's not like the structured headgear royals seem to wear on other paintings, it looks improvised to me, was this a thing?
Also both their gestures are interesting. He is upright and has this hand gesture that resembles religious paintings and probably has a meaning I don't know about and she is bowing her head slightly. Also their faces intrigue me. He looks at us in a serious manner, yet she looks at him with a slight pleasing smile. There are emotions to be read here, it's no like those poker face portraits of so many royals and nobles.
Another thing is that she rests her left hand in her ballooned belly, and I always wondered whether she was pregnant because both the dress and the gesture point towards that. If this is her wedding as you suggested and she is pregnant that seems like a noteworthy thing too, although I read somewhere many years ago that she is not pregnant and it is all a fashion choice, a sort of bustle for the front area, which is a puzzling fashion choice I would love to know more about.
I also find it interesting that he supposedly is this Italian merchant with a very Italian name, yet Arnolfini's face doesn't come across as particularly mediterranean to me. In fact, he looks very much the prototypical Nordic/Scandinavian ice.
Finally the composition is just, ugh just amazing: The windows opposite to the red bed frame that mirror themselves and create parallel vertical lines, the hands of the couple in the center creating an inverted triangle and the mirror behind as a vanishing point, giving dimension and a 3D feeling to the painting. The couple is perfectly encased in this room that seems to expand through the mirror.
This painting has technical mastery, composition, mystery and emotion: all the hallmarks of a master piece.

[katehobbs]

I think that there would be a strong narrative to this painting, because there always was in that epoch. The extremely sad drawn face of the man, the burnt-out candle, and the empty worn wooden clogs, suggest to me that it is a posthumous portrait of his wife. The wife Costanza of the Arnolfini cousin, also called Giovanni Arnolfini, died possibly in childbirth the year before the portrait was signed, and the woman appears to be heavily pregnant.

[deadman]

This was my favorite painting as a kid. I was a geek, or what Jean Shepherd called a technical kid. As he pointed out on the radio, technical kids experience the greatest highs and lows. There is nothing like the despair when the transistor you spent months saving up to buy pops, and there is nothing like the elation when the project finally works. Furthermore, we are ostracized from the things art historians seem to think is so important, such as expressions of love. I cannot count the number of times I have just met someone, who upon finding out that my primary training is in mathematics and computer science, hears, "I'm not a number person; I'm a PEOPLE person." This is always factually wrong, as you have to be pretty sociopathic indeed to say something like that to someone you have just met, but the attitude is common and not only to be taken for granted but de rigeur to achieve status points in the humanities and arts.

To us, technical mastery IS emotional at the highest echelons. Many look down on it, of course, and consider it beneath them, but we already know and understand this attitude, as it has been so rudely imposed it on us repeatedly. Still, there is a kind of joy and elation we get that arts and humanities types may never experience due to their supercilious smug snotting. Perhaps such people will never apprehend let alone understand how we can perceive something such as Noether's theorem, General Relativity, or the decoherence interpretation of quantum behavior at a level far more numinous and awesome than all your cherubs gods and myths and loves. When Richard Feynman was asked for a picture of his playing the bongos to "humanize" an article on his physics, he became offended and stated that physics was one of the highest and most human of achievements. I do not think this will ever be recognized in any of the humanities, and I'm pretty sure why.

As Haruchi Murakami observed, if you can't understand it without an explanation, you can't understand it with an explanation. I'm pretty sure that people who actually DO great art, as opposed to simply talk about it, understand exactly what I mean, even if they sometimes play the game to get the social yummies. I am indebted to Peggy Goodman, a high-school classmate who is one of the extremely few people I remember from being wrongfully imprisoned I might want to talk to, for showing me this. She was a splendid artist, and when I said I had no artistic talent. she said we were exactly the same. I could do art when inspired, but she could do it without being inspired. Similarly, she could do math only when inspired, but I could do it without being inspired. That's a great insight, but it's rare.

Nor is this limited to visual, let alone "fine" art (just LISTEN to yourselves!) or words. Here's a Pentatonix song which hits just the same registers:

[silvertbird]

To some extent it is the mystery of the subject matter which makes the painting more interesting, though purely from a technical standpoint it is also fascinating, and probably the closest thing to a photograph from the 15th century. I can’t believe someone can take some globs of paint, brushes, and a wooden panel and create something like this.

[DanScott]

So this then is, a painting about loss, about love, about rememberance. Which then means, I understand it's pain, it's aloofness, it's humanity. That's powerfully interesting. A life lived and lost in one canvas.

[BabyBoomerChannel]

I think there’s more to this than stated. The woman’s pregnancy, on her wedding day. Her chair (or throne?), behind her. The man’s chair seems to be lower than hers. And what are those beads hanging by the chair? I believe this one has more to it.

[dosterix]

One of the most beautiful artworks of the middle ages. And no it isn't necessarily a "renaissance" artwork.

[marlonborcherds]

I like it, I think it's a Token of love for the dude in the blacks main piece as they were not able to consummate their love in life.
They tiny hints allow the viewer a space to ponder and personalize the image.

[elsiemabel]

Could you look at “Carnation, Lily, Lily, Rose” by John Singer Sargent and/or “The Apparition” by Gustavo Moreau?

Love your channel btw