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Source Description
Enthroned as Queen of Heaven, Mary holds her son, who turns with an affectionate gesture to embrace Saint Joseph while angels play music. Mary's husband is pictured as an old man who needs to use glasses to read. The inscription on the scroll below tells us that Mary was both mother and virgin, and Joseph's old age testifies to the Christian miracle of the virgin birth. The painting was probably the central part of a polyptych (an altarpiece consisting of several panels).Rather than looking to ancient art as a model as so many of his Italian contemporaries did, Defendente Ferrari considered northern European painting with its close attention to naturalistic detail to be a proper source for engaging religious art.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
18355
label
The Holy Family with Angels
core
obj
dtoType
drawing
citationUrl
pageCount
1
Source metadata
id
18355
sourceUrl
contentType
drawing
stage
normalized
title
The Holy Family with Angels
description
Enthroned as Queen of Heaven, Mary holds her son, who turns with an affectionate gesture to embrace Saint Joseph while angels play music. Mary's husband is pictured as an old man who needs to use glasses to read. The inscription on the scroll below tells us that Mary was both mother and virgin, and Joseph's old age testifies to the Christian miracle of the virgin birth. The painting was probably the central part of a polyptych (an altarpiece consisting of several panels).Rather than looking to ancient art as a model as so many of his Italian contemporaries did, Defendente Ferrari considered northern European painting with its close attention to naturalistic detail to be a proper source for engaging religious art.
provenance
Don Marcello Massarenti Collection, Rome [date and mode of acquisition unknown] [1897 catalogue: no. 90, as manner of Filippo Lippi]; Henry Walters, Baltimore, 1902, by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.
date
ca. 1520 (Renaissance)
citationUrl
rightsUri
CC0
language
en
genreSpecific
Painting & Drawing
oil paintings (visual works)
panel paintings
imageCount
1
pageCount
1
source
import
dimensions
units
cm
width
147
height
72
depth
1
dimensionsRaw
Painted surface H: 57 7/8 x W: 28 3/8 x D excluding cradle: 3/8 in. (147 x 72 x 1 cm)
Source extras
inscriptions
[Transcription] In scroll at bottom: PARTVS ET INTEGRITAS DISCORDES TEMPORE LVNGO
VIRGINIS IN GREMIO FOEDERA PACIS HABENT; [Translation] Childbirth and chastity, long time discordant, have a bond of peace in the lap of the Virgin
med
oil and gold leaf on wood panel
creator_ids
4994
collection_ids
REN
exhibition_ids
none
Single page context
seq
1
pageIndex
0
type
photo
mediaId
2419fe875d00b0b4