ALTARPIECE OF THE LIFE OF THE HOLY VIRGIN

OBSERVATIONS 

As far as composition, style and characterisation of the figures are concerned, these reliefs are very similar to those fragments of the Betrothal and Circumcision belonging to the Mayer van der Bergh Museum, Antwerp, and those representing the Betrothal of the Virgin belonging to the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, both of which have been identified as coming from Brussels workshops in the first few decades of the second half of the XV century. All of them, in turn, express a certain continuity regarding earlier altarpieces, such as those of Funchal, Rieden and the relief of Sotopalacios (Burgos) on which the layout of the background mountains in the Nativity scene is probably based.