1502
tempera
canvas
From the collection of Art Institute of Chicago
The Nativity is a 1502 tempera by Pietro Perugino, a Early Renaissance work, held at Art Institute of Chicago.
You see Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus in a simple stable, with shepherds and angels gathered around. The colors are soft—pinks, blues, and golds—with a quiet glow over the scene. This painting was part of a *predella*, a row of small panels at the base of an altarpiece. Each panel showed a moment when Jesus’s divine nature was revealed. This one focuses on his birth, but it’s just one piece of a bigger story. To see how Perugino built these scenes, look up *tempera*—the paint he used, made with egg yolk and pigment.
These four panels , together with another one depicting the Resurrection (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), once constituted a predella—a series of small pictures, often narrative scenes, forming the base of an altarpiece. These predella scenes depict moments when Jesus’s divine nature was revealed: at his birth, at his baptism, during his conversation at a well with a Samarian woman, at his res-urrection, and through his appearance to Mary Magdalene after his resurrection. The painting that once surmounted the predella as the focal point of the altarpiece has not been identified.
Alexander Barker, London, by 1852 to at least 1857 [lent to London 1852 and Manchester 1857]; sold by Barker to William Ward (d. 1885), first Earl of Dudley, London, by 1868 [lent by Dudley to Leeds 1868]; sold Christie’s, London, June 25, 1892 (nos. 76-77, 79-80. The Resurrection, no. 78, was sold separately and is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art), to Durand-Ruel, Paris and New York, acting on behalf of Martin A. Ryerson [according to letters from Durand-Ruel to Ryerson dated June 25 and 29, 1892 in the Art Institute archives]; sold by Durand-Ruel to Martin A. Ryerson (d. 1932),…
London, British Institution, 1852, no. 31. Manchester, Art Treasures of the United Kingdom, 1857, no. 85. Leeds, National Exhibition of Works of Art, 1868, no. 2905. London, Royal Academy of Arts, Works of the Old Masters, 1871, no. 308. London, Royal Academy of Arts, Works by the Old Masters, 1892, no. 146. The Art Institute of Chicago, Selected Works of Old and Modern Masters, 1898, no. 12. The Art Institute of Chicago, A Century of Progress, 1933, no. 123a. Canton, Ohio, The Art Institute, 1955 (no cat.). Chicago, Art Institute of Chicago, Glad Tidings of Great Joy. Christmas at the Art…
Read the full account in the museum source.
Pietro Perugino (US: PERR-ə-JEE-noh, -oo-; Italian: ; born Pietro Vannucci or Pietro Vanucci; c.
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