AERTSEN, Pieter
(b. 1508, Amsterdam, d. 1575, Amsterdam)

Triptych with the Adoration of the Magi (central panel)

c. 1560
Oil on panel, 190 x 73 cm
Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

In the 1550s Pieter Aertsen produced several major altarpieces, however, little remains of them, since many were destroyed in the Iconoclasm of 1566. Two panels are in the Rijksmuseum which once belonged to the same triptych with the Adoration of the Magi: the larger being the central panel, the other the left wing. On the reverse side of the left wing the scene of Circumcision (or the Presentation in the Temple) can be seen.