St John Altarpiece (Memling) similar Memling work is the "" held at the Louvre, which Georges Hulin de Loo determined to have been completed earlier than the "St John Altarpiece" and the New York panel. The "Cellier Diptych" has the Virgin and Child in an enclosed garden with the same two Saints Catherine and Barbara on the left-hand panel. The composition is remarkably similar to the New York panel and the altarpiece, with the Virgin on her throne and St Catherine and St Barbara positioned to form a triangle. The "Cellier Diptych" includes four additional female saints (with attributes) sitting around the Virgin: St
Altarpiece Reformation regarded the Word of God – that is, the gospel – as central to Christendom, and Protestant altarpieces often displayed the actual words from the bible, sometimes at the expense of pictures. With time, Protestant though gave birth to the so-called pulpit altar, or "Kanzelaltar" in German, in which the altarpiece and the pulpit are combined, thus making the altarpiece quite literally the abode of the Word of God. Canvas painting started to replace other types of altarpieces during the mid-16th century and onwards. The Middle Ages was the heyday of the production and use of altarpieces. While many