Robert Campin

Robert Campin (1378?-1444), identified with the Master of Flémalle, one of the founders and great masters of the Flemish school of painting, born in Tournai, Flanders. The identity of the Master of Flémalle cannot be unquestionably confirmed, but most scholars agree that he and Campin are the same man. Campin became a master painter in Tournai in 1406 and remained active there until his death, painting mainly altarpieces and religious panel paintings. He broke with the idealized, artificial International Gothic style to pursue a revolutionary interest in realism.

Three principal innovations distinguish Campin's art and set it apart from the Gothic: his conception of the human figure in solid, three-dimensional terms; his awareness of perspective; and his preoccupation with the details of everyday life. These qualities are tentatively evident in early works such as the famous triptych the Mérode Altarpiece (1425?, The Cloisters, New York City). They reach their full development in his late masterwork, the Werl Altarpiece (1438, the Prado, Madrid). The Saint Barbara panel, for instance, is set in a highly realistic contemporary Flemish interior, rich with detail, and the skillful perspective of the room is continued through an open window into an outdoor landscape; the figure of Saint Barbara is rounded and realistic, draped in rich, almost sculptural folds of material. Campin's work exerted an important influence on the two later masters of Flemish art, his pupil Rogier van der Weyden and Jan van Eyck.