Triptych of Jean de Witte and Maria Hoose

The Bruges Master of 1473 is named for a triptych dated to that year, and this Triptych of Jean de Witte and Maria Hoose is a donor triptych — a private devotional altarpiece commissioned by a specific couple for their domestic chapel or for donation to a church. Triptych donor portraits, in which the patrons kneel in prayer on the wings while a sacred subject occupies the centre, were a standard form of Flemish private devotion in the 1470s–90s. The 1473 date places this commission in the mature phase of the Flemish altarpiece tradition, when the format had achieved its classic organisation.

The Bruges Master employs the Flemish oil technique of the Van Eyck tradition as it had developed by the 1470s: meticulous material description, luminous flesh, and the careful spatial construction of the interior setting where the donors kneel. Jean de Witte and Maria Hoose are depicted with the portrait realism that distinguishes Flemish donor portraiture — physiognomy individualised, costume rendered with specific detail that identifies their social rank.