More about the Antwerp 'hand':
The HAND as A MARK |
At the back of some retables, a mark would be engraved into the wooden panel. Here you can see the Antwerp city-mark: two hands above the castle. | ||
From
1470 the mark was mandatory on gothic "retables". It meant this was
a first class woodcarving from Antwerp. Production ended about
1550, when new ideas about art and religion conquered large parts of the
European continent.
Though many have been destroyed, more than 200 of these great, large altarpieces can still be found in churches across Belgium and also in the USA, Australia, Great-Britain...; an unknown number belong to private owners. |
A beautiful gilded
silver jar, made in Antwerp about 1558, representing Tunis' conquest by the Emperor Charles V. |
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