This altarpiece is perhaps the most monumental painting ever begun by Van Orley. With the shutters open, the work is 7m wide and 4.30m high. The middle panel shows the crucifixion and is flanked, on the left, by the mocking of Jesus and the carrying of the cross and, on the right, by the lamentation and the descent into purgatory. The triptych was commissioned by Mary of Hungary in 1532. In doing so, she carried out, by order of Charles V, the last will and testament of her aunt, Margaret of Austria, who had died in 1530. It was the intention of the two governors that the altarpiece should adorn the burial chapel of Margaret of Austria, and her second husband Philibert II of Savoy, in Brou Burgundy (FR). However, Barend van Orley died in 1542, leaving the work unfinished. In 1550, when Charles V decided to take the remains of his grandfather, Charles the Bold, from Nancy and bury them in a mausoleum in Bruges, Margaret of Parma decided, in 1558, that the triptych should be completed by Marcus Gerards and repurposed in the Church of Our Lady of Bruges, where it would adorn the high altar, near the mausoleums of Charles the Bold and Mary of Burgundy. The church still owns the piece, and it is still preserved in situ.

MASTERPIECE

Margaret of Austria, governor of the Netherlands, was widowed twice in a short time, after which she never married again. From those marriages, she held the dowers of Castile and Savoy, which made her a wealthy woman. She used her wealth for prestigious purposes, and she surrounded herself with a large bevy of artists to whom she gave many commissions. She was also conscious of her own legacy and decided that she wanted to be buried in three places: her body in Brou, her intestines in Mechelen and her heart in Bruges in the monastery of the Annunciades. This last order was only carried out in 1550, thanks to her nephew, Charles V, who set up a chapel in memory of Margaret. This consisted of a mausoleum, stained-glass windows and a triptych for the altar. In 1578, the monastery and this burial chapel were demolished in the run-up to a siege. The mausoleum in Mechelen also no longer exists. The burial chapel in Brou, by contrast, shines in all its splendour, albeit without the Bruges altarpiece.

This artwork is the property of the Church of Our Lady in Bruges and is managed by Musea Brugge.