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{{Short description|Medieval altarpiece in Westminster Abbey}}
{{EngvarB|date=September 2013}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=December 2024}}
[[File:Westminster 400.jpg|thumb|300px|The ''Feeding of the Five Thousand''; one of the better-preserved sections of the altarpiece]]
The '''Westminster Retable''', the oldest known [[panel painting]] [[altarpiece]] in England,<ref name="hamilton">[http://www-hki.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/research/hist/wr.html Hamilton Kerr Institute] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110505211108/http://www-hki.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/research/hist/wr.html |date=5 May 2011 }}, with full image of the retable, accessed 13 July 2010</ref> is estimated to have been painted in the 1270s in the circle of Plantagenet court painters, for [[Westminster Abbey]], very probably for the [[high altar]].<ref name="WAbbeyRetable">{{cite web |title=Retable |url=https://www.westminster-abbey.org/about-the-abbey/history/retable |website=Westminster Abbey |access-date=4 May 2023 |language=en}}</ref> It is thought to have been donated by [[Henry III of England]] as part of his [[Gothic architecture|Gothic redesign]] of the Abbey.<ref name="nationalgallery">[http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/exhibitions/westminster/default.htm "Westminster Retable: England's Oldest Altarpiece"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090507110758/http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/exhibitions/westminster/default.htm |date=7 May 2009 }}, National Gallery Exhibition Description, and [http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/about/press/2005/apr_retable.htm accompanying press release] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080616151727/http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/about/press/2005/apr_retable.htm |date=16 June 2008 }}. Retrieved 24 December 2008.</ref> The painting survived only because it was incorporated into furniture between the 16th and 19th centuries, and much of it has been damaged beyond restoration. According to one specialist, the "Westminster Retable, for all its wounded condition, is the finest panel painting of its time in Western Europe."<ref>Tudor-Craig, 105</ref>

In 1998 the [[Hamilton Kerr Institute]] in Cambridge, with support from the [[Getty Foundation]] and the [[National Heritage Lottery Fund]], began a six-year project to clean and conserve what remained of the work. Upon completion, it was displayed at the [[National Gallery]] in London for four months in 2005 before being returned to Westminster Abbey,<ref name="Smedley">[http://www.electric-review.com/archives/000260.html "The Westminster Retable at the National Gallery"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081120070940/http://www.electric-review.com/archives/000260.html |date=20 November 2008 }}, ''The Electric Review'', by Bunny Smedley, 27 May 2005. Retrieved 24 December 2008.</ref> where it is displayed in the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Galleries in the Abbey's [[triforium]].<ref name="WAbbeyRetable" />

==Description==
[[File:Westminster Retable.jpg|thumb|left|Upper part of figure of Saint Peter]]
The retable measures 959 x 3330 mm (approximately 3 feet by 11 feet) and is painted on several joined [[oak]] panels using thin glazes of colour in [[linseed oil]] on a [[gesso]] ground.<ref name="WAbbeyRetable" /> The construction is complex, with six main flat panels, and several other wooden elements.<ref name="hamilton"/> The retable is divided into five sections by gilded wooden arcading,<ref name="westminster-abbey.org">[http://www.westminster-abbey.org/history-research/art-architecture/retable/ "Westminster Retable"], Westminster Abbey: From 1065 to Today. Retrieved 24 December 2008.[http://www.rics.org/NR/rdonlyres/3432EAC1-6E14-4F12-8A6C-FA2A17FE156D/0/Fig3Retablerendered.jpg Image]</ref> with ''[[pastiglia]]'' [[relief]] work, elaborate glass inlays, inset semi-precious stones and paste gemstones, to imitate the lavish goldsmith's metalwork found on some surviving retables and shrines on the Continent, and the now destroyed Shrine of [[Edward the Confessor]] installed in the Abbey in 1269.<ref>Tudor-Craig, 115-6. For example the [[Pala d'Oro]] in Venice (compared by Tudor-Craig, 102), or the [[Shrine of the Three Kings]] in [[Cologne]].</ref>

The composition has a central section with three tall narrow openings defined by tracery containing full-length figures of Christ holding a globe as [[Salvator Mundi]], flanked by the [[Virgin Mary]] holding a palm, and [[St John the Evangelist]]. To the sides are two sections each with four small medallions containing depictions of the [[Miracles of Christ]], those to the right missing completely and those to the left showing the raising of Jairus' daughter, the healing of the blind man, the feeding of the 5,000 and another subject, too defaced to identify. The outermost sections contained single figures, to the left [[St Peter]], dedicatee of the Abbey and the best preserved single figure, with the figure to the right now missing completely; according to [[George Vertue]] this was St. [[Paul the Apostle|Paul]].<ref>[http://woolstonviolins.com/images/RetableFrontView.jpg ], Tudor-Craig, 103.</ref> These sidemost panels were evidently added when most of the retable had been completed, and are of German rather than local [[Thames Valley]] oak, and the grain runs vertically, rather than horizontally as on the four panels making up the central three sections. The back of the retable, which would have been invisible, is painted as imitation [[Porphyry (geology)|porphyry]].<ref name="hamilton"/> Much of the retable is lost beyond recovery.

[[File:Detail of Christs Globe from the Westminster Retable.jpg|thumb|Detail of the globe in Christs hand showing scenes of animals, trees, and a man in a boat.<ref name="Tudor-Craig102-3" />]]
The painting is of very high quality, probably by an artist used to working on [[illuminated manuscript]]s, to judge by the fine detail of the work, and some stylistic details. In its position on the high altar the detailed images would only have been clearly visible to officiating clergy, and no concessions were made to more popular taste.<ref name="Kramer">[http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1026/is_5_168/ai_n15895199/pg_1?tag=artBody;col1 "The Westminster Retable"], published in ''Magazine Antiques'', by Miriam Kramer, November 2005. Retrieved 24 December 2008.</ref> The tiny globe held by Christ is painted with four registers of scenes showing animals, trees, and a man in a boat.<ref name="Tudor-Craig102-3">Tudor-Craig, 102-3</ref>

==History==
After the [[Benedictine]] abbey was [[Dissolution of the monasteries|dissolved]] in 1540, the retable panel was made into the lid of a chest, with the main painted side facing down, that was used to store wax funeral effigies of English monarchs.<ref name="hamilton"/> In the eighteenth century, the two right hand panels had their medieval paint removed and covered in grey and white paint. The Retable was discovered by [[George Vertue]] in 1725, but in 1778 serious damage was caused when the chest was modified into a cupboard or display case to show the [[funeral effigy]] of [[Pitt the Elder]].<ref>[http://www.socialaffairsunit.org.uk/blog/archives/000440.php Bunny Smedley], website of The Social Affairs Unit, with a fuller description.</ref>

In 1827, the Retable was seen by the architect [[Edward Blore]], then Surveyor of the Abbey, and his rediscovery was published in ''[[The Gentleman's Magazine]]''.<ref>1827, Part I, p. 251 (Binski 1988:129 note 5.</ref> Blore had the Retable removed from the chest and set in a glazed frame.<ref name="Binski 1988:129">Binski 1988:129.</ref> Since its rediscovery, the piece has been further damaged by attempted restoration efforts, which included a coating of glue intended to hold together painted layers.<ref>Paul Binski, "The Earliest Photographs of the Westminster Retable" ''The Burlington Magazine'' '''130''' No. 1019, Special Issue on English Gothic Art (February 1988:128-32); the retable was first photographed in 1897</ref> In 1858, watercolours of the Retable were made for the [[Society of Antiquaries of London]]; a conjectural restoration was included in [[Viollet-le-Duc]]'s ''Dictionnaire raisonné du mobilier français'',<ref>Vol. I (Paris, 1858) plates IX and XXII (noted by Binski 1988:129 note 6).</ref> and plates accompanied [[William Burges]]'s essays, published in 1863, on painted objects at Westminster Abbey.<ref>Included in the second edition of [[George Gilbert Scott]]'s ''Gleanings from Westminster Abbey'' (1863).</ref> The first photographs of the Retable were published in 1897.<ref name="Binski 1988:129"/>

It is currently housed in a glass frame to protect it from further deterioration. From 1827 to 1902, the Retable was kept in the [[Jerusalem Chamber]], before being moved to the south ambulatory. It was later displayed in the [[Westminster Abbey Museum]], along with Pitt and the other wax effigies, until the museum closed for redevelopment.<ref>[http://www.westminster-abbey.org/visitor/plan-of-the-abbey/13608 Westminster Abbey], [http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/41660000/jpg/_41660376_altarpiece.jpg BBC image of the panel on display]</ref> Since 2018, the Retable has been on display in the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Galleries in the abbey's [[triforium]].<ref name="WAbbeyRetable" />

==Notes==
{{reflist}}

==References==
*Tudor-Craig, Pamela, in: Wilson, Christopher and others: ''Westminster Abbey'', Bell and Hyman, London, 1986, {{ISBN|978-0-7135-2613-4}}

==Further reading==
* Binski, Paul; Ann Massing (eds); ''The Westminster Retable: History, Technique, Conservation'', Turnhout: Harvey Miller, 2008, {{ISBN|978-1-905375-28-8}}
* Macek, Pearson Marvin. 'The discoveries of the Westminster Retable, 'Archaeologia, 109 (1991), 101–11. Publisher: Society of Antiquaries of London. {{ISSN|0261-3409}} (and his unpublished thesis at Michigan Univ, Ann Arbor, 1986)

[[Category:Westminster Abbey]]
[[Category:English paintings]]
[[Category:Catholic paintings]]
[[Category:Gothic paintings]]
[[Category:1270s paintings]]
[[Category:Paintings of Jesus]]
[[Category:Paintings of the Virgin Mary]]
[[Category:Paintings of John the Baptist]]
[[Category:Paintings of Saint Peter]]
[[Category:Paintings of Paul the Apostle]]
[[Category:Paintings in London]]

Westminster Retable - Revision history

imported>Ham II: added Category:Paintings in London using HotCat