Altarpiece of the Joiners' Guild
Sizes
One object, one inventory number: KMSKA holds the three panels as 245-249 and they are sold whole. Three sheets, one edition - from $470.
Three panels, each 260 cm tall and together 503 cm across, sold as the joiners of Antwerp saw them above their altar: the Lamentation between the martyrdoms of the two Johns. The museum reads the whole as grief and evil, Christ's bloodstained body among those who loved him at the centre, and at either side executioners whose faces recall the grotesque heads Leonardo was drawing in the same years, which Massys must somehow have seen. The three sheets are chosen so the printed images hang level, as the panels stand level on the altarpiece.
Made for Made for the altar of the joiners' guild in the Cathedral of Our Lady in Antwerp, where each guild of the city's artisans kept an altar of its own; commissioned from Massys in 1511 and in the city ever since. source
KMSKA's order: the Beheading of John the Baptist on the left, the Lamentation at the centre, the Martyrdom of Saint John on the right - the triptych open, 260 cm tall and 503 cm across in Antwerp. All three panels are the same height, so the tiers are built to hang the printed images level: within 0.00% on Wall and 0.00% on Grand.
Printed on demand as one edition. The whole image is printed on every sheet — never cropped to fit — so each panel carries an archival margin.