God the Holy Spirit Polyptych
Lluís Borrassà·1394
Historical Context
Lluís Borrassà, the foremost Catalan painter of the International Gothic style, completed this monumental God the Holy Spirit Polyptych in 1394 for the church of Santa Maria de Manresa. The ambitious multi-paneled retable reflects the prosperity of this Catalan city and its confraternities, who commissioned elaborate altarpieces as acts of communal devotion. Borrassà's workshop dominated Catalan painting from the 1380s through the 1420s, establishing a distinctive regional variant of the International Gothic.
Technical Analysis
The large-scale polyptych follows the characteristic Catalan retable format with tiered registers of narrative scenes surmounting a predella. Borrassà's technique features sinuous linear rhythms, rich surface patterning in textiles and gold brocade, and the elegant, attenuated figure types of the International Gothic style.
