Diptych of Maarten van Nieuwenhove

Hans Memling's Diptych of Maarten van Nieuwenhove, painted in 1487 and preserved in the Sint-Janshospitaal, Bruges, is one of the most innovative Netherlandish portraits. The donor is shown praying before the Virgin and Child in what appears to be a single continuous room reflected in a convex mirror—an ingenious spatial device that places the sacred and secular in the same domestic space. Nieuwenhove was a young Bruges patrician who later became burgomaster.

Memling achieves remarkable spatial unity across the two panels through the reflected interior in the convex mirror, while his smooth oil technique creates luminous flesh tones and the meticulously rendered stained-glass window identifying the sitter.