Status Updates From The Museum of Lost Art

The fact that artworks possess a primary value that is non-intrinsic [pigment on hemp canvas v a gold coin or silverware for which the value of the raw materials is not far from value of finished object]… is important, because an external value system is thus placed on them.

It is easy to forget that works we associate w/great artists were not necessarily their greatest most influential creations; often they are just the ones that happen to have survived, winning the historical rolll of the dice.

The “Deposition” can boast an impressive influence over the centuries, held in a prominent collection, accessible to admirers thinkers & artists. One wonders what different maybe greater influence the “Justice Cycle” might have had, had fortune allowed it to act as a pt of pilgrimage for artists for centuries more.

Destroyed in bombardment of Brussels by French in Aug 1695 during 9 Years War

Durer visited chamber in 1520 just to see them

Admired for scale, dozens of figures & formal complexity

It’s sobering to consider how many masterpieces by renowned artists we have lost. Rogier is now best known for his “Deposition” (@ Prado) but during his lifetime his “Justice Cycle” was his monument.

Of all the lost art that was more import culturally historically & in terms of influence than works by the same artist that have survived foremost might be Roger van der Weyden’s fire-consumed paintings for the Golden Chamber of Brussels Town Hall (1439)..4 colossal pntgs each on theme of justice, each 3.5m tall & 10.5m wide altogether. Only know from descriptions copies & a tapestry (1459) that’s most complete