page_title: Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata (van Eyck)
section_title: Condition
hierarchical_section_title: Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata (van Eyck) / The panels / Condition
context_page_description: Saint Francis of Assisi Receiving the Stigmata is the name given to two unsigned paintings completed around 1428–1432 that art historians usually attribute to the Flemish artist Jan van Eyck. The panels are nearly identical, apart from a considerable difference in size. Both are small paintings: the larger measures 29.3 cm x 33.4 cm and is in the Sabauda Gallery in Turin, Italy; the smaller panel is 12.7 cm x 14.6 cm and in the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The earliest documentary evidence is in the 1470 inventory of Anselm Adornes of Bruges's will; he may have owned both panels.
  The paintings show a famous incident from the life of Saint Francis of Assisi, who is shown kneeling by a rock as he receives the stigmata of the crucified Christ on the palms of his hands and soles of his feet. Behind him are rock formations, shown in great detail, and a panoramic landscape. This treatment of Francis is the first such to appear in northern Renaissance art.
  The arguments attributing the works to van Eyck are circumstantial and based mainly on the style and quality of the panels.
context_section_description: The panels are in relatively good condition given their age. The Philadelphia version is better preserved; it has superior tonalities and more prominent colours.  In 1906, Roger Fry gave it a well-documented restoration with overpaint removed. Fry was at the time Curator of Paintings at the Metropolitan Museum and performed restorations despite a formal lack of training; the St Francis was the second restoration he undertook. He attributed the work to Hubert van Eyck, and thought the Turin version a copy. His removal of a section at the top revealed a red border; he wrote that van Eyck had "conceived it as a miniature in oil on panel, and that it might indicate a date not very far removed from the drawings of the Turin Book of Hours" (Milan-Turin Hours). In 1926 he recorded: "When it came to me, the panel was considerably larger at the top, and dull opaque sky concealed the join where the extra piece had been added on to satisfy some owner who did not appreciate the compressed composition of the original. The sky had been enlivened ... with a crowd of small white-cloud like forms suggesting the presence of a cohort of angels." His restoration removed more than 10 centimetres; before the restoration it measured 24 cm × 16 cm (9.4 in × 6.3 in), afterwards 12 cm × 14 cm (4.7 in × 5.5 in).
  Further conservation was undertaken between 1983 and 1989 using a stereo microscope. Restorers removed varnish that had turned brown as well as layers of old fillers – one of which contained the pigment viridian, not available until 1859. They stripped paint additions from the mountain peaks, Leo's robe and in the area around Francis's tonsure. The removal of overpainting revealed an X that had been scratched into the original paint on the upper right stones at some unknown time. According to Butler, the removal of pigment exposed underlying paint in "amazingly good condition".
  The Turin panel has suffered heavy overpainting and cracking along the vertical join. The marbleized reddish-brown paint on its reverse is heavily worn. In the 20th century the panel underwent three restorations and extensive technical analyses. The earliest, in 1952, removed overpainting and repaired pigment loss to Francis's tonsure, Leo's cowl and areas of vegetation between the two figures. Restorers discovered an irretrievably lost inscription on a rock adjacent to the seraph-Christ, and evidence of earlier overpainting of one of Leo's feet. Continued paint loss and cracking along the join required further restoration in 1970, when a fixing agent was applied to prevent cracking, and Francis's tonsure was repainted.
  Cracking along the vertical join of the wooden panels was severe enough to warrant a third restoration in 1982. Raking light revealed that modern varnishes had yellowed, while further overpainting was found. Working under ultraviolet light, paint from earlier restorations was removed, uncovering lost colours and landscape details, including the snow-capped mountains and birds of prey on the upper left. Restorers found clues to sources of confusion in earlier restorations, especially the unusual positioning of Francis's tonsure and Leo's feet, which were discovered to be crossed under his body.
caption: Detail showing flora and birds in flight (Turin). The transitions between cloud and sky are achieved through hatching. A rectangular area of overpaint is visible as a broad stroke immediately above the tree.
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