The Moulins Triptych: a Renaissance masterpiece restored to its former glory

A masterpiece revealed in all its splendour

Following a display at the Louvre, Jean Hey’s Triptych of the Virgin in Glory is now on display at the Royal Monastery of Brou. Painted around 1498 for Moulins Cathedral, this monumental painting – 1.57 m high by 2.83 m wide with the panels unfolded – is one of the finest examples of French Renaissance painting. After more than three years of study and restoration, the triptych commissioned from the artist by Anne of France and Pierre II of Bourbon has regained the brilliance of its original colours. A documentary film traces the stages of this exceptional project, which visitors can discover as they follow the exhibition route.

Jean Hey, the long-unrecognised genius

For centuries, the triptych was attributed to the ‘Master of Moulins’, an unsigned masterpiece. A broad scientific consensus has since identified its creator: Jean Hey, a painter trained in Ghent who worked for French patrons between 1475 and 1505. A master of Flemish painting techniques, he is renowned for the precision of his portraits and the psychologicaldepth of his facial expressions.

The exhibition brings together a rare overview of his work — court portraits and religious compositions — gathered from the four corners of Europe especially for the exhibition in Brou.

Two Renaissance masterpieces, one venue

Visiting Brou to see the triptych also offers the chance to rediscover the monastery in a new light. The two works share the same roots: the same family circle—the Bourbons—the same Flemish influences, and the generous patronage of a woman.

Anne of France, co-patron of the triptych, raised the young Margaret of Austria at court and passed on her love of the arts to her; Jean Hey, incidentally, painted the young princess’s portrait around 1490. Margaret of Austria, the future founder of the monastery, was also the daughter-in-law of Margaret of Bourbon, who was herself the sister of the triptych’s patron, Peter II of Bourbon. 

What the exhibition reveals in the painting, the monastery expresses in stone, stained-glass windows and sculpture — a striking continuity between these two masterpieces from the same era.