How the Ghent Altarpiece Was Broken Apart When the Ghent Altarpiece returned home after Napoleon's defeat, it seemed as though justice had prevailed. The masterpiece was back in St. Bavo's Cathedral, where it had inspired worshippers and visitors for centuries. After surviving religious unrest and becoming a trophy of war, one might have expected its turbulent journey to finally be over. (source: By Jan van Eyck / Presumably Hubert van Eyck - Google Arts & Culture — 7QERA2Cq

By the end of the eighteenth century, the Ghent Altarpiece had already survived more than three hundred years of religious upheaval. Hidden from iconoclasts and preserved through periods of uncertainty, it seemed as though the masterpiece had weathered its greatest storms. Europe, however, was about to enter a new era of conquest. (source: By Jan van Eyck / Presumably Hubert van Eyck - Google Arts & Culture — 7QERA2CqwU1bcQ, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/inde

The Ghent Altarpiece was created as an object of devotion, but it quickly became something much larger. In medieval Europe, religious artwork was never simply decoration. Paintings, sculptures, and altarpieces were powerful symbols of faith, community, and influence. They represented the wealth of the people who commissioned them and the importance of the institutions that displayed them. (source: By Jan van Eyck / Presumably Hubert van Eyck - Google Arts & Culture — 7QERA2Cq

This is the story of how one medieval masterpiece survived six centuries of theft, war, political upheaval, and one of the greatest unsolved mysteries in art history. (source: By Jan van Eyck / Presumably Hubert van Eyck - Google Arts & Culture — 7QERA2CqwU1bcQ, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=192762536) Some works of art become famous because of the genius of the artist who created them. Others become famous because of the extraordinary storie