Abstract
The early Renaissance Netherlandish painter Geertgen tot Sint Jans lived his entire life as a layman in the Haarlem monastery of the Brotherhood of St. John (hence his nickname).
He spent his youth in Bruges in Flanders. He was the first of the Netherlandish painters to depict the Nativity of Christ as a night scene, where supernatural light emanates from the baby Jesus and from the angel announcing to the shepherds.
Similarly, light emanates from Jesus' apparition at the Adoration of the Three Kings in Prague's National Gallery.