Demon in the stable
Sir: It was a pleasure to read Martin Gayford’s excellent article on the Portinari altarpiece by Hugo van der Goes (Arts, 15–29 December), but I suspect the spirit of Christmas might have misguided him in regard to a couple of details. The artist’s name is not in fact pronounced like that of the bird which graces festive tables, but with a guttural, Flemish aspirate — ‘hoose’. More significantly, among the painting’s symbols, some of which he catalogues, he omits to mention the presence of a particularly malignant demon in the stable, complete with fangs and claws which, though it might grace an M.R. James story, somewhat undermines the ‘feeling of cold but cosy midwinter’ Gayford detects in the work. The demon’s appearance is a unique instance in paintings of the Nativity. Why the artist introduced it remains a mystery, though clues may lie in his troubled personality, which, as Gayford informs us, the chronicle of Gaspar van Ofhuys so vividly exposes.
Mark Glanville
London W5
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