Mikó Árpád szerk.: "Magnificat anima mea Dominum" M S Mester vizitáció-képe és egykori selmecbányai főoltára (A Magyar Nemzeti Galéria kiadványai 1997/1)

TANULMÁNYOK / ESSAYS - MOJZER MIKLÓS: A festő hagyatéka, ahogyan ma látjuk

MIKLÓS MOJZER THE BEQUEST OF THE ARTIST: AS WE SEE IT TODAY The Visitation Owing to the work of the restorers Péter Menráth and Szilvia Hernády, Visitation has regained its original character. This simple fact alone would have provided sufficient grounds for declaring the completion of the restoration to be a red-letter day in the life of the Hungarian National Gallery and presenting the painting, along with the lessons of the restoration work, to the public in a special exhibition. However, the Gallery has gone even further: it has decided to stage a unique presentation by bringing together all the surviving panels of the old altarpiece, along with the Adoration of the Magi: another one of Master M S's panels, now held in Lille. The exhibition, therefore, commemorates the old altarpiece. We feel the recovery of Visitation to be such a momentous event, which can justify a little - not entirely unfounded - prejudice on our part. We are of the opinion that the history of this panel, in fact, conceals the nearly four-hundred-year-long fate of an unknown artist's oeuvre. The artist has remained nameless for centuries (to the best of my knowledge, he has been identified neither in the published literature, nor in any unpublished manuscript). The Visitation, the first to be discovered of Master M S's panels, was found in the attic of the Church of Tópatak (Goldbach, today Bansky Studenec) about a hundred years ago by a craftsman. He took the painting to a pawnshop in the neighbouring town of Selmecbánya (Banská Stiavnica), but was later unable to redeem it. Finally, the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts purchased the panel for a price that was considered quite handsome at the time. Although not attributed, the painting soon earned several mentions in the literature, to the point that it was eventually named among the greatest works of German Mediaeval panel painting. It was not until the First World War, the time when restorers of the Christian Museum of Esztergom removed the overpaints from their own four panels signed „M S", that the common origin of all these paintings became clear. It soon became quite probable that the paintings, along with a sixth panel now held in the Church of Szentantal (today Antol), had once formed part oTthe same altarpiece. Nevertheless, of the six panels, the Visitation remained the only one that earned itself a reputation among European historians. Outside Hungary this was more or less the only panel to be reproduced, and the signature „M S" became almost synonymous with this painting. The explanation lies, perhaps, in the fact that with this work the artist created something extraordinary, even by the standards of his other paintings. Of the surviving six panels, this was the one that was painted in the lightest tones. This is the only panel which features an extensive landscape background, with two moving, or rather levitating figures. All the other compositions depict several figures, forming a much more dramatic composition altogether. Visitation, on the other hand, is almost emblematic, and has a lyrical overtone, which is in sharp contrast with the much more sombre chords of the other panels. The Visitation is almost like a flag. Two paintings from the original altarpiece are definitely missing: the first and the fourth, i.e. The Annunciation and The Adoration of the Magi. To give us a rather good idea how the latter might have looked, we have the panel held in Lille - unless this very occasion produces some new evidence, leading us to believe that the painting held in Lille is in fact identical with the missing fourth panel. As to The Annunciation, we might have to accept the fact that it will never turn up. Undoubtedly, this painting also depicted two figures and was unique within the group in the sense that the scene was set in an interior; placed in juxtaposition with Visitation, therefore, it offered comparison and contrast. What a powerful tool we would acquire in our search for the artist's identity, if we knew how he had depicted interiors! Unfortunately, the surviving panels can provide us with no clues in this respect. In any case, we do have to admit that the painter came closest to fulfilling his own potentials in composing Visitation. The composition of the two figures, connected with the kissing of the hand, the tiny figures disappearing in the vast landscape, the idyllic fairy-tale world of both the foreground and the background, all presented in transparent colours - these are purely the artist's inventions. This painting discloses the least borrowing, or rephrasing, of archetypes. The idyllic scene of Mary's and Elizabeth's encounter outshines all the