Mirror Mirror

Yesterday I had one of those art imitating life experiences. I was scheduled to give a talk in front of Jan Van Eyck’s Arnolfini Portrait (above) in the London National Gallery. To while away the train time, as I sped towards my destination, I read Noah Charney’s The Art Thief in which there is a scene in which a professor- you’ve guessed it- delivers a lecture to his students in front of Van Eyck’s masterpiece.  Of course, I couldn’t resist holding up the book and telling the students about it when I arrived- they were amused at this strange juxtaposition of fact and fiction.

In this way, the Charney book became a kind of distorting mirror because there were certain discrepancies between my talk and the fictional art historian.  For instance, he calls the painting the Marriage Contract, but I’ve never called it that, although I know that Erwin Panofsky was the first to suggest that the presence of the two witnesses in the convex mirror at the back of the painting implied such a ceremony. According to the Bible, you cannot put someone to death on the word of one witness- ditto for proof in marriage ceremonies. Also, I don’t think the dog on the floor symbolises loyalty, it’s more likely to convey lust given Arnolfini’s adulterous proclivities.

So I and the literary professor occupied our own parallel universes, never quite colliding otherwise we’d both cease to exist. And what better place to reflect on the relationship of art and life than in front of Van Eyck’s Arnolfini Portrait which boasts one of the most illusionist devices ever conceived- the mirror in which the world of the painting is simultaneously caught and elided. The Charney book functioned in the same way; it reflected aspects of my own art history professional existence whilst demonstrating they weren’t exactly true, just part of a fictional framework.

Van Eyck’s mirror within a painting continued to pursue me as I journeyed homewards. Animated advertisements on the underground, operating rather like screen-savers, competed for my attention. First, the convex mirror looming larger than life, than the zooming out to reveal the room, which, remember, was in a painting regarded by students and their art professor who held up a book in which a similar scene was being enacted.   

Comments

[H Niyazi]

I found this via the glories of link within! How fascinating!!

I tend to veer towards the memorial portrait reading(the snuffed candle particularly) bit am not averse to it being some proclamation of love signed and witnessed by Van Eyck.

H