Flemish Painting
At the end of the Middle Ages some of the most active centers of painting were in Flanders, the low-lying country bordering on the North Sea and largely contained in present-day Belgium. Here, for more than a century, artists rivaled the best of their European contemporaries, including well-known Italian masters.
The brilliant attainment of Flemish artists of the fifteenth century was fostered by the competition of rich patrons. The ruling house of Burgundy took precedence, with commissions for paintings, sculpture, tapestries, vessels of precious metal, fabulous jewelry, and hand-written books illuminated in gold and lapis lazuli. But the dukes of Burgundy were not the only patrons of the arts. Religious orders, trade guilds, municipalities, and well-to-do private citizens of such prosperous towns as Ghent, Bruges, Brussels, and Tournai distributed generous commissions in all of the arts and crafts. (...)