Virgin and Child 1460

Editor: We’re looking at Dirk Bouts’s "Virgin and Child," from around 1460. It's an oil painting and it feels… surprisingly intimate. The texture of the paint, especially the craquelure, really emphasizes the age and material presence of the piece. What strikes you about it? Curator: It’s intriguing how Bouts uses oil paint to depict not just the figures, but the *stuff* of their lives, their material conditions. Consider the intense drapery, the implied weight and expense of those pigments; that red would have been extremely costly, impacting the commissioning process. Where do you see that playing out? Editor: Well, the fine details of Mary's clothes, maybe? But then the Christ child…he's painted with a rawness, a startling realism that clashes with the idealization of the Virgin. Curator: Precisely. What does that rawness *do*? The artist is demonstrating painting competence through both careful realism, as well as material status via expensive color, and contrasting a working class labor activity. Look at how the physical handling of the paint constructs these meanings. Editor: So, the way Bouts actually *uses* the oil paint is as important as the subject itself. It speaks to class and labor in the creation of the artwork. It becomes like a commodity...the colors themselves speak to the resources put in it? Curator: Absolutely. It is revealing the socioeconomic implications inherent within the representation of religious figures. Even this sacred scene isn’t free from those material realities. Editor: I hadn't considered that level of...material investment before. It changes how I see Early Renaissance paintings. Thank you. Curator: My pleasure. It is a different way of thinking about devotional pieces, yes?