The Pearl of Brabant

The nickname Pearl of Brabant, the museum explains, describes the whole effect of this small altarpiece, above all the way light moves through it. Follow the panels from left to right. On the left wing John the Baptist stands in broad daylight, pointing to the Lamb of God. In the centre the Three Kings kneel before the Virgin, among symbols and legends about her purity. On the right wing the giant Saint Christopher carries the Christ Child on his shoulder at sunset. In the Golden Legend, Christopher had set out to serve the greatest king in the world, and this child turns out to be him. Who painted it is an open question. Writers were already trying to separate the triptych from Dieric Bouts in 1902. Some give it to an anonymous hand called the Master of the Pearl of Brabant, others to Bouts's son, Dieric the Younger. The museum keeps the elder Bouts's name, around 1465, and says plainly that the attribution is disputed.