Entry of Christ into Jerusalem

Van Dyck was about 18 when he painted this, still working in Rubens's busy Antwerp studio. The year was 1617, and within a couple of years Rubens would describe the young man as the best of his pupils. The scene of Christ riding into Jerusalem is handled with a confidence that seems unlikely for a teenager, all bright colour and quick, slashing brushwork, the crowd pressing around the donkey. Everything here is borrowed, brilliantly, from the master down the corridor. On the left a powerfully built man stoops right down to lay a branch in Christ's path, precisely the kind of straining, muscular figure Rubens built his big canvases around.