Flemish art at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts | God is there, but not everywhere

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts presents an exhibition of the great Flemish masters all summer long which will amaze those who are not very interested in Flemish art – and also those who adore it!

At a time when museums are seeking to renew (rejuvenate, etc.) their clientele, the great Montreal museum chooses to present three centuries of Flemish masterpieces for its major summer exhibition. For what ?

“These portraits are the selfies of the era,” asserts Katharina Van Cauteren, of the Phœbus Foundation. It is this Antwerp organization which is behind the exhibition and which owns almost all the works that are part of it.

“Instagram, YouTube, Netflix are completely unthinkable without what you see here”, specifies the art historian who refers to the way in which Flemish artists of the time told stories, by creating a new language visual that we still use today.

Katharina Van Cauteren was in Montreal this week for the opening of this exhibition which is divided into seven themes. We met her in the room dedicated to vanity – because with the explosion of trade and money in the 15th^e and in the 16th century^e century also came a rise in vanity for certain individuals, without much surprise.

We could very well have had this discussion on art, the ego and modernity in the room where the portraits are presented, perhaps the most beautiful part of this very modern exhibition, precisely, and which goes to the against prejudices that one may have about Flemish art. We think of the great Flemish masters and we often have in mind images loaded with symbols, and loaded simply, which very often represent God and his people. Explicitly or symbolically. Formally splendid works; often heavy. We are definitely not in the gardens of Giverny.

The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts brushes aside these ready-made ideas – often a legacy of reproductions that we have seen too often on all kinds of merchandise – and succeeds in presenting to us the work of the Flemish masters in a light different, much thanks to an extremely efficient layout and hanging.

Extraordinary works

In the portrait section, the walls are blue and emerald green. This highlights the works. An example: the surprising canvas lips are sealed by the satirical painter Quentin Metsys, a magnificent representation of a slightly disturbing madman. Would the work be as brilliant elsewhere?

Certainly not in a more traditional layout.

“These paintings have stories to tell,” she continues. […] They can be very rock and roll. »

It’s quite fair.

An eloquent example: Hell – a painting created by an anonymous artist from Hieronymus Bosch’s entourage. This depiction of the end of the world is timeless – a bit surreal. Completely unspeakable, destabilizing. Beautiful, although it is a scene of horror: the majority of citizens of the time feared not being admitted to paradise, therefore, of burning in hell.

If religion is there, at the beginning of the exhibition and then almost everywhere, women are absent.

Not in representation, but in execution since, although art was not forbidden to them, they were instead expected to stay at home or in the family business.

“Feminism had not yet been invented and there was nothing wrong with having female roles and male roles, since that was the way God had created things,” says Katharina Van Cauteren, who nevertheless clarifies that God “was a man, obviously. »

An exception: with the paintings of Rubens and Van Dyck, there are those of Michaelina Wauthier, a rare woman who carved out a place for herself in the Flemish artistic elite of the 17th century.^e century – but whose work was recognized… in the 20th^e century.

A historical context

What can explain this rise of art, in this place, at this time?

In the 15th^e and in the 16th century^e century, the cities of Antwerp, Bruges and Ghent experienced an economic boom which led to the emergence of a class of entrepreneurs, which transformed the whole of society and allowed more criticism of influence of the Church. This gave birth to a civil society, then encouraged the development, and commerce, of art.

According to the general director of the Montreal museum, Stéphane Aquin, this exhibition is an opportunity to renew our way of looking at the past. And this should be a sufficient argument to attract a diverse clientele.

“We question the past to better examine the present,” explains Stéphane Aquin. The past is rich in lessons for our times. It teaches us that we did not invent globalization 20 years ago. Several of the contemporary issues linked to the exploitation of nature and social justice were already raised in the 16th century.^e and in the 17th^e century. It’s fascinating. »

The museum team is still relying on a dynamic communication strategy on social networks to reach this younger clientele. In this spirit, the Montreal museum also launched refreshment evenings in the spring which allow you to have a drink and visit the exhibition, in the presence of musicians. The Flemish art exhibition will also have its refreshment evenings – and other special activities, but only in the fall – the exhibition ends in October.

This summer, we are focusing more on outdoor activities around the pedestrian Avenue du Musée, with tourists representing around 75% of visitors to the museum in the summer.

Vice, virtue, desire, madness: three centuries of Flemish masterpieces is organized by the Phoebus Foundation and the Denver Museum of Fine Arts, in collaboration with the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

Visit the exhibition page