Comparing Arnolfini Portrait And Fra Filippo Lippi

The Renaissance is known to be a time of classical rival, with an interest of the classical antiquity. There was a large boom of a wide range of subjects, themes, techniques, and the allegorical meanings within portraits. As a result, not all works during the Renaissance era followed the same kind of cliché. Some works displayed portrayed a very official type of agreement between powerful families, while others were an extension of a famous type of religious theme. This variety isn’t just a result of the grand enlightenment that was brought with the onslaught of the Renaissance, but was also a result of the regional differences as well. An analysis of both the Arnolfini Portrait and Fra Filippo Lippi’s Madonna and Child gives art historians

Here, it’s not all about the traditional subject of power like the Arnolfini Portrait shows, but moving beyond the tradition by not having a Madonna that was steeped in medieval traditions of being very somber, gold plated, and having elongated faces and limbs. Instead Madonna’s halo is very thin and delicate and her hair is elaborate while Madonna’s face is sculpted and has soft cheeks highlighting her shadowed eyes. It’s not just Madonna who makes the work livelier, but it’s also the mischievous looking angels as well. The one angel looking at the viewer has a playful smile and has the small fleshy body of a young child. That angel boosts up the baby Christ who almost clutches at the delicate clothes of the praying Madonna. The clothes are very real in their own way as well--- a characteristic that is shared with the Arnolfini

In particular, the symbols of piousness can be seen throughout the room and is not obvious like in Madonna and Child. For example, the burning candle on the chandelier would’ve symbolized in this era, the omniscient presence of god. Candles wouldn’t strike a modern day viewer as religious as much as the prayer beads near the mirror would. Even what the subjects are doing (their unity with the holding of hands) could be interpreted as something holy and binding and that this portrait is a recording of such an event. In summary, the central subjects doesn’t have to be divine themselves to make a work religious like in Madonna and Child, but can include symbols of divinity and piousness. The Arnolfini Portrait is as every way as religious in its composition as the Madonna