Abraham And Melchizedek Analysis

Discussion Topic 4: Rubens and Tapestry Design The Meeting Between Abraham and Melchizedek, by Rubens is a preparatory oil sketches from the 1620s until 1633. The story behind the composition is Melchizedek, King of Salem, met Abraham who was offering him wine and bread. He was on his way back from defeating Chedorlaomer. This was a four-stage process for Ruben. The first stage was named, The Fitzwilliam bozzetto: Rubens, The Meeting of Abraham and Melchizedek, made in 1622-25. It was 6 1/8 by 6 1/8 inches. The second stage was named The Prado modello: Rubens, The Meeting of Abraham and Melchizedek, made in 1625. This stage was 25 5/8 by 26 ¾ inches; a little bit more than four times as big as the first. The third stage which is my favorite

Abraham’s bottom clothing now has lines of texture. The boy who has his arm around the horse clothing now changed color. Because the image is a lot darker, there are more shadows and it appears to be more contrast. The two men on the bottom right now are more muscular, including the bread man but that may be because of the new shadows the image has. The lightest place in the composition is in the middle of Abraham and Melchizedek. The image is now smaller and the frame is shown less than the third stage. I believe Ruben did this in order to shown the most important aspect of the image, which is the interaction with Abraham and Melchizedek. In the final completed tapestry of The Meeting of Abraham and Melchizedek the image was completely flipped around but everything was exactly the same. In the final image Ruben decided to just outline the whole image and only have some color in the tapestry. The only colors that were used were yellow/gold, green blue and red. If you noticed most of the color shown is just on the robes for the characters and on the top where the angels are holding. I believe Rubens reasoning for this it to emphasize his view of the meeting between Abraham and Melchizedek in only highlighting the important figures in his