Rogier Van Der Weyden: A Long Forgotten Master

Rogier van der Weyden - The Magdalene Reading - c. 1445 - Oil, transferred from wood to mahogany, 62x55 cm - National Gallery, London (click photo for larger image)Rogier van der Weyden (c. 1399 – 1464) was a Flemish painter who, with the possible exception of Jan van Eyck, was the most influential northern European artist of his time. Though most of his work was religious, he produced secular paintings (now lost) and some sensitive portraits. By the middle of the 19th century, his fame and art had all but been forgotten. Only through a meticulous research have scholars over the past century been able to reconstruct Rogier's work and restore his reputation as one of 15th-century Flanders' leading masters. 

This beautiful figure seated on a cushion reading a devotional book can be identified as Mary Magdalene by the jar at her side, in reference to the ointment with which she anointed Christ's feet (Luke 7:37-8). When the painting was cleaned in 1956 it was discovered that its dark uniform background, applied probably in the nineteenth century, had concealed the body of Saint Joseph holding a rosary, part of a window with a landscape view, and the foot and crimson drapery of another figure, identified as Saint John the Evangelist.