Triptych: Rest on the Flight into Egypt

The central section of this triptych depicts the Holy Family resting upon their flight into Egypt to escape the persecution of King Herod. The two flanking panels of the triptych depict scenes from the Passion (on the left wing, Christ Debating the Church Fathers, Simon's Prophecy and Christ's Interment, and on the right, Christ Bearing the Cross, the Crucifixion and the Lamentation) and are thought to have been painted by artists other than Patinir. These seven subjects were frequently depicted in Flanders at the time as the Seven Sorrows of the Madonna, and normally flanked either a Pieta or Mater Dolorosa image. There are no other known examples of the Rest on the Flight into Egypt, as seen here, dominant over the other six subjects. In this regard, it is thought that the small round paintings on either side of the triptych were painted by someone other than Patinir. Even though technically the Flight into Egypt is a religious subject, here the painter was clearly more interested in the depiction of the landscape that spreads behind the Madonna than in the figures themselves. Patinir did not create pure landscape paintings, rather he normally produced paintings, as here, that were nominally religious in subject matter. Clearly these subjects were just excuses to paint landscapes, with the scenes that spread into the far distance the real subjects of the paintings. Thus said, however, it is possible that Patinir thought of the landscape as a stage setting surrounding a religious scene, and it thus might be a mistake to consider as separate the depiction of the landscape and the central subjects in his works.(Source: Masterpieces of the National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo, 2009, cat. no. 9)