Alterskapet fra Andenes. En liturgisk lesning av skapets ikonografi med hovedvekt på Nådefader-gruppen i skapets corpus

Abstract

Title:  The Altarpiece from Andenes. A Liturgical Reading of its Iconography

The article discusses the liturgical function of the motif of Notgottes, and the connection between this and the St. Olav iconography. The discussion focusses on the altarpiece from Andenes (Nordland, Norway, about 1500), now in the Tromsø museum’s church collection. It consists of predella, corpus and doors that can be opened, i.e. it could be described as a “hinged triptych”. The corpus consists of wooden sculptures: (from the beholder’s left) a holy bishop, God the Father holding the dead Christ as Schmerzensmann in His arms (a motif also called Notgottes), St. Olav and St. Magnus Earl of Orkney. On the inner side of the doors there are four painted scenes from the Passion of Christ, and the outside likewise figures four passion scenes including a crucifixion, which has been interpreted (by Patrik Reuterswärd 1980) as St. Olav’s passion according to a contemporary text. The altarpiece thus may illustrate St. Olav as imitatio Christi. The sculptural group almost certainly also included an angel with a chalice in his hands collecting blood from the wounds of Christ, represented as red threads (chalice and threads now lost). This detail indicates a nexus between the angel and the content of a prayer in the core of the Eucharistic cycle, the Súpplices te rogámus, asking for God’s acceptance of the gifts lifted by “the hands of an angel to the Altar of Heaven”.