Jan van Eyck, Arnolfini Portrait, oil, London, National Gallery, 1434
Jan van Eyck is thought to have been born close to 1390, most likely in Maastricht. He was a Flemish painter who carried diplomatic services out. In 1425, Philip The Good, Duke of Burgundy, whose properties included Maastricht, named him court painter and valet de chambre. Thanks to his diplomatic tasks, van Eyck was able to travel a lot and he also visited Italy. All those journeys increased his cultural and artistic knowledge.
Many of his regular commissioners were rich merchants and bankers, the ones who improved Flemish economical level. Among them, there was Giovanni Arnolfini, who arrived from Lucca to Bruges in 1420.
The painting called “I coniugi Arnolfini” portrays Giovanni Arnolfini and his wife, Giovanna Cenami (daughter of a merchant from Lucca). It dates back to 1434, even though it’s not sure if the theme is about their marriage or their engagement.
The room is full objects and significant details, but the ones which tell the story of women’s Fashion of the day are the sandals placed in a seemingly random way, the white veil on Giovanna’s head and the wide green gown she’s wearing.
The wooden and leather sandals in the foreground are men’s, the red ones into the background, under the bed, are women’s. This kind of Dutch clogs were typical of people leading a life based on hard work. Van Eyck probably put those sandals in his painting so that they can make the impression of a familiar dimension (and of a marriage that has already taken place) to the spectators.
The white veil was typical of women from a certain social status and was sustained on a woman’s head sides by a specific hair up-do embroidered with braids, pearls or other jewels (depending on one woman’s family financial holdings).
The gown Giovanna is wearing shows a bulge on her abdomen which was thought to have been the sign of her pregnancy (plus, the ivory statue of Saint Margaret overwhelming the dragon, patron of women in childbed, strengthened this hypothesis). But if we consider the gown other women are wearing in famous paintings of the day (such as “Magdalena reading” by van der Weyden or the “Woman holding a balance” by Vermeer), we can figure out that kind of dress were just fashionable or, at least, we can suppose it was a propitiatory model to wish fertility to young women.
Because of the meticulous attention to details Flemings – and especially van Eyck – channelled in their works of art, many art critics realized that not only the shape of the clothes but also their colours and the colours of tapestry could hide a secret meaning. Unfortunately, our knowledge of these meanings and the skill to read them faded away over time so we are no longer able to properly understand them as a man born in the XV sec. would have.