The Donor’s Image: Gerard Loyet and the Votive Portraits of Charles the Bold

400 Pages·2000·28.027 MB·English

by  Hugo van der Velden

THE DONOR'S IMAGE
BURGUNDICA
II
THE DONOR'S IMAGE
GERARD LOYET
AND THE VOTIVE PORTRAITS
OF CHARLES THE BOLD
Hugo van der V elden
BREPOLS@l
© 2000, Brcpols Publishers n.v., Turnhout, Belgium.
Printed in the E.U. on acid-free paper
D/2000/0095/ 42
ISBN 2-503-50722-0
Designed by Floris Tilanus
Translated by Beverley Jackson
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without
prior permission of the publisher.
The signature of Gerard Loyet on p. VI is reproduced after ADN, B 2096,
nr. 67241
To my parents
_... ., .
~]i-~"'r'·~
; £
CONTENTS
ABBREVIATIONS OF ARCHIVES AND LIBRARIES IX
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS XI
I
INTRODUCTION EARLY NETHERLANDISH ART
AND THE VALUE OF THE MATERIAL WORLD 3
Part I I A GOLDSMITH AT THE COURT OF BURGUNDY
Chapter 1 I A DOCUMENTED LIFE OF GERARD LOYET 11
Appointment to Charles the Bold 11
Background and the mint of Burgundy 17
Early years at the mint of the Low Countries 21
Residency in Bruges 23
Later career at the mint 1477-1500 25
Chapter 2 I THE RECONSTRUCTION OF A LOST OEUVRE 29
Goldsmith at the court of Burgundy 29
The wedding of 1468 33
The Garter and the Golden Fleece 38
The trappings of power 52
Sculpture 60
Chapter 3 I THE ASSESSMENT OF A REPUTATION 65
Income and revenue 65
The appreciation of the goldsmith's art 67
Gerard Loyet and the Couronne Margaritique 73
Part II I VoTIVE IMAGES OF CHARLES THE BoLD
Chapter 4 I AN ICON OF THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY 81
The Liege statuette 81
The war of 1467 91
The duke and St Lambert 93
The war of 1468 95
The presentation of the gift in 1471 98
Chapter 5 I THE ICONOGRAPHY OF THE LIEGE STATUETTE 107
An unconventional image 107
The initial plans of 1467 111
The relic 115
StGeorge 122
Summary: the image in context 152
VII

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book is a revised and translated edition of the dissertation Gerard
Loyet & Karel de Stoute. Het Votiljportret in de Bourgondische Nederlanden on the
strength of which I was awarded a doctorate by the Universiteit Utrecht in
1997. I had previously taken this subject as the theme of a lecture for a
symposium on The Image if the Individual at the W arburg Institute and the
British Museum, London, in March 1995. Having originally planned to speak
on the boti in SS Annunziata, I ended up giving an account of the votive
image of Charles the Bold in Liege, and one thing led to another. So my first
thanks are due to the organisers of that symposium, Nicholas Mann and Luke
Syson, for inviting me to speak on that occasion.
In the course of my research, the Istituto Universitario Olandese di
Storia dell'Arte (NIKI) in Florence frequently provided help and
accommodation, for which I should like to thank the Director, Bert Meijer,
and the rest of the staff. In 1994 I was awarded a grant by the Reiman-De Bas
Fund, a subdivision of the Prince Bernhard Fund, which enabled me to stay
in Italy. The Institute for Art History and Musicology of the Universiteit
Utrecht and the De Gijselaar-Hintzen Fund helped to finance the illustrations,
and the Research Institute for Culture and History (RICH) of the Universiteit
Utrecht and the Dutch Postgraduate School for Art History made resources
available for the final editing work. The English translation was funded by a
generous grant from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research
(NWO). I am very grateful to all these institutions for their assistance.
I should like to thank all the staff of institutions whose hospitality I
have enjoyed, and everyone who contributed in any way at all to the
realisation of this book. I would mention a few people specifically. Philippe
George, the curator of the Tresor de la Cathedrale de Liege, was always
willing to help me; thanks to his mediation, the statuette of Charles the Bold
was photographed again especially for this book. I benefited greatly from the
comments of Wim Blockmans, Lome Campbell, Christian Klamt, Jos
Koldeweij, Maximiliaan Martens, James Marrow - who took the trouble to
come to Utrecht for the presentation of my doctorate - and Cees Vellekoop.
I should like to thank Rene Stuip for the patience with which he answered
my questions about the interpretation of Middle French vocabulary and for
his help in editing the sources. Kim van Bogaert provided similar assistance
before him. Any inaccuracies that may have crept into the documents
reproduced here are of course entirely my own responsibility.
The book was translated from the Dutch by Beverley Jackson, not
only an excellent translator but also a very critical reader, from whose
comments I learnt a great deal. It was a privilege to be able to entrust the
book's layout to a friend, Floris Tilanus, who also made the reconstruction
drawings. I am grateful to Paul Taylor for all the discussions that enabled me
XI
to hone my thoughts, and to him and Mariana Giovino for their hospitality in
London. In Brussels I could always count on being welcomed by Henk van
Enk and Brett Silver, and by Herman Speyart van W oerden and Maria Silvia
Gatta. I should like to thank Jeroen Jeneson, Geert Jan ter Linden and Dirk
Oud for their friendship, and also Ann-Sophie Lehmann, whose perspicacity
was an additional boon. Ghislain Kieft urged me to read Aby W arburg's
Bildniskunst und jlorentinisches Biirgertum in 1988, which set me on the road to
this subject.
I owe an especial debt of gratitude to my mentor Jeroen Stumpel,
who supervised the work that led to my doctorate in 1997. His involvement
in the past few years was of immense importance: I benefited from his original
views and from his gift for going to the heart of a problem.
Finally, I want to thank Barbara den Ouden. She provided extremely
patient assistance with the translation and editorial work, and spent hours
listening to the disconnected hunches and half-formed ideas from which this
book eventually emerged. Her sound judgment and common sense were a
constant source of support.
Utrecht, 5 March 2000
XII