The Ambassadors' painting.. How did you personify the division of the Catholic Church and hid "death" under the feet of men?

At first glance, "The Ambassadors" by German artist Hans Holbein the Younger, looks somewhat like a photograph of two 16th-century figures.

And "Holbein the Younger", a German Catholic artist and official painter of King Henry VIII of England, he painted more than 100 pictures that captured the unique expressions of its main characters, yet the "Ambassadors" painting holds an exceptional position among his paintings, for a secret included in the painting that the spectator sees only from an angle specific.

confusing period

The most famous painting of Holbein, who lived his entire artistic life in England, is elusive to direct interpretation, as it contains details of a still life and a portrait of two people in nearly life-size, in addition to a "secret death" hidden in one corner of the painting.

The painting, painted since 1533, is being examined by hundreds of historians.

Because the double image, displayed in the National Gallery in London, is a puzzle in which every detail seems to have multiple meanings.

To begin to comprehend this work, one must first understand the political dimensions that surrounded Holbein's life, and his complex biography.

Holbein painted The Ambassadors in 1533. In the same year, King Henry VIII quarrels with the Pope over the Catholic Church's refusal to grant him a divorce from his first wife.

Henry married "Anne Boleyn" anyway, and his separation from Queen Elizabeth I was thorny, and after only one year, the king separated from Rome and established himself at the head of the Church of England.

This placed much of the blame on Pauline as having "bewitched" Henry, and causing a split.

Prior to his appointment to the king's court, Holbein had gained fame in his native Germany by painting religious portraits.

That is, until his arrival in England, he had not immersed himself in secular portraiture, a form of painting that emerged in the Renaissance.

Therefore, Henry's separation from the Catholic Church opened the door for reform and human thought to enter England, which was translated into a renewal that reached many levels, according to the cultural site "Big Think".

ambassadors

This conflict is greatly embodied in the painting The Ambassadors by the German artist.

It depicts the French ambassador to England, Jean de Dentville, bulging in a fur coat of silk and velvet and lynx on the left, having dressed up and ordering the painting in huge proportions and elaborate detail to hang in his palace.

Part of Dentville's job was to report to Catholic France about what was going on in the English court with the Church.

According to the Artstor website, the ambassador wrote to his family that year, "I was, and still am, very tired...I am the saddest and most tired ambassador in the world."

While on the right side of the painting is his moderately dressed friend George de Self, a clergyman and temporary diplomat of England, who spent most of his career trying in vain to stem the tide of the Lutheran Reformation and reunification of the Catholic Church.

As a result, these two ambassadors find themselves in a helpless position, witnessing events that they could not influence in any way.

However, the painting was able to make up for their plights, embodying one concept: the Renaissance and the importance of man as the center of both the earthly and celestial realms.

Within this scope, each element in the painting reflects a brief account of modern humanity and death.

And here comes the mystery of the painting: the secret death hidden at the bottom of it.

death lurks

Centuries before 3D designs were developed, Renaissance painters were able to entice their audience to look at pieces from new angles by playing with the whole painting's perspective.

One of the most famous examples of this technique is the "Ambassadors" painting.

According to the Artsy website, medieval Latin theory focused on human mortality as an inescapable fact and as a means of urging people to reject vanity and the short-lived joys of earthly bounties.

Because the painter was influenced by the ecclesiastical art he had always practiced in Germany, the skull hidden here at the edge of the lower panel was an invisible symbol of the inevitability of death that lurks with all that life and its details painted on the huge canvas embodying life.

The skull may appear to be an ominous sign placed between two young men in well-groomed clothes with signs of advancement in the ranks of life, but it seems that Dentville himself, who commissioned the painter, admired the Latin symbol for death called "Memento Mori".

Therefore, it was a reminder of the inevitable annihilation of man, but its distortion also suggests other symbolic readings.

They are not visible in the painting except from a specific angle.

The obscuration of the skull may be due to convey a metaphorical idea that death is the center of the world, as it literally covers the middle circle in the pattern of the floor under the two ambassadors.

Moreover, the visual illusion experience in this way draws attention to the fact that human vision is limited and limited, which forces viewers to question their true place in the world.

life stays

However, in the upper left corner, behind the green curtain, the artist also hid a symbol of Christ in its iconic status.

Some art historians believe that this "engraving" is associated with the skull of death to hint that there is more to death, in the sense of the afterlife.

It is also believed that the hidden icon represents the division of the church.

Made in standard sizes, the oil painting on oak wood has been on display at the National Gallery in London since 1890, and is considered one of the world's most valuable paintings.