The Virgin with the Swaddled Child

1520

From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art

Dominant colour

The Virgin with the Swaddled Child is a 1520 by Albrecht Dürer, a Renaissance work, held at Cleveland Museum of Art.

Who painted this?: Albrecht Dürer
When & what style?: 1520 · Renaissance
Where can I see it?: Cleveland Museum of Art

About this work

The Virgin with the Swaddled Child is a painting of Mary holding a tightly wrapped baby Jesus. This painting is different from others of the same subject because it shows the Virgin and Child as large, serious figures. The baby Jesus is wrapped up tightly, which might remind us of his future death. To learn more about this style, look up the technique of chiaroscuro.

The story of this work

Overview

This image is among Dürer’s most sorrowful depictions of the Virgin and Child. In contrast to earlier engravings of the subject, Dürer presents them as monumental figures. Here, the Virgin sits on a large cushion and pensively cradles a tightly swaddled Christ Child. His wrappings, closed eyes, and stiff appearance evoke his future death and his burial shroud, emphasizing the outcome of his Passion as well as Mary’s foreknowledge of the events. Dürer draws attention to the Virgin’s holiness by rendering her halo as a white orb that radiates shafts of light over the earth. Dürer’s sculptural…

Read the full account in the museum source.