The calling of Matthew

Cornelis Engebrechtsz.'s Calling of Matthew presents the moment when Christ summoned the tax collector Levi, who became the apostle Matthew, from his money-changing table — a subject with particular resonance in Leiden, where Engebrechtsz. was the dominant painter. The Calling of Matthew was associated with themes of conversion, the abandonment of worldly wealth for spiritual mission, and the universality of Christ's call to all social classes. Engebrechtsz.'s treatment, with its characteristic Leiden style blending late Gothic elegance with emergent Renaissance spatial awareness, demonstrates the independent northern Netherlandish pictorial tradition that Engebrechtsz. helped establish before the generation of Lucas van Leyden.

The painting demonstrates the technical conventions and artistic vocabulary of the period, with attention to composition, color, and the rendering of form appropriate to the subject.