Virgin and Child, Brittany, End of the 15th century

Long remained in the walls of a private Norman establishment, this beautiful monumental Virgin and Child can be linked by its singular style to the most beautiful Breton productions of the end of the Middle Ages.
Represented here in the guise of a delicate and slender young woman wrapped in an ample azure mantle, Mary bows with tenderness and melancholy towards her son. Dressed in a small cape, the frail toddler with chubby thighs comes alive in the arms of his protective mother.
The delicate oval face of the Virgin is marked by two half-moon eyes, and a small mouth with thin lips, pinched at the corners, surmounted by a totally smooth philtrum. This very singular drawing of the lower part of the face of Mary is typical of the Breton sculptural tradition of the second half of the 15th century andcan be found in an entirely identical way on the nursing Virgin in the chapel of Saint Budoc de Plomeur. This one also presents a similar hair, with chiseled lengths, held back by two locks which release the contours of the face of the Virgin as well as her neck.
With very prominent interlocking V-folds, Marie's coat is a remarkable testimony to the Flemish influence which then pierced regional production. The beautiful virgin of Plougonvelin also testifies to this. Because indeed, as the latest scientific work on the subject has shown, far from being away from the main artistic trends as we have long wanted to believe, Brittany appeared in the second half of the 15th century ,on the contrary, very permeable to external influences imported from Italy or as here, from the Southern Netherlands.

©Galerie Sismann