Uwagi o zróżnicowaniu stylowym i modalnym w malarstwie tablicowym Małopolski .......... 377

STYLISTIC AND MODAL DIFFERENTIATION IN THE PANEL PAINTING OF LESSER POLAND

Apart from their purely artistic qualities, historic artworks also serve as valuable documentary evidence. Deciphering the historical context, or the way of reception of images by medieval viewers, is not easy if written documentary evidence that might shed some light on the circumstances in which a given artwork originated is missing. Art historians, however, have tools at their disposal to help them identify the message embedded in paintings, corresponding with the reality of the period in which they originated. One of such tools is a method, put forward by Jan Białostocki, of distinguishing the manner in which the message is conveyed in a work of art, known as the modus, a term originated from the rhetorical modes theory, within a broader definition of style. The present paper is an attempt at employing this method in practice – in an analysis of the pictorial programme of a few altarpieces that originated in Lesser Poland, approximately between 1440 and 1460, in which all three modes, known as modus gravis, modus mediocris, and modus humilis, can be identified.