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Details: This is an image from the play Lucifer. It is an influential and controversial work by Joost van den Vondel (1587-1679), the colossus of Dutch literature, regarded as a major influence on Milton’s Paradise Lost. In the story, Lucifer returns from Eden, his wings singed by the beauty...
Details: This large oil painting was thought to be an early, rough sketch for the ceiling of the Salone de Biblioteca Antica in the Palazzo degli Studi in Naples. The attribution to Bardellino was based on the sketch's similarity to another sketch by the artist, sold in New...
Details: Archbishop Peter Kairo (centre) from Nyeri diocese blesses ceremonial chalices during a rehersal for Africa's first Roman Catholic beatification ceremony. Final preparations were being made to host thousands of worshippers, officials and visitors who are expected to congregate 23 May for the event in the town of...
Details: In depicting Abraham’s heavenly guests (Genesis 18:2-10), Georg Pencz took the unusual step of having a divine being touch Abraham, illustrating the Protestant idea of God’s presence in everyday life. The scene also reminded viewers of faith rewarded, because the angels tell Abraham that he and...
Details: These leaves are from a lectionary (a book of gospel readings used in church services) that was presented to the Holy Trinity Monastery at Chalke in Constantinople by the Empress Katherine Komnene in 1063. The tools of the scribe's trade are laid out before the evangelists: a...
0:00/1× Details: Throughout most of their history these alabaster mourners have evoked a sense of awe and mystery as well as curiosity and admiration. They were originally arranged in processional order around the sides of the ducal tomb within a marble arcade in the Chartreuse de Champmol. The...
Details: Battista Franco was one of Michelangelo’s most devoted followers: his biographer Giorgio Vasari wrote that he drew every figure on the master’s Sistine Chapel ceiling. In Franco’s own works, such as this print, he made new, inventive compositions that emulated Michelangelo without directly copying or quoting...
Details: This dreamlike painting shows Jacob’s encounter with an angel on his journey home to Canaan. Jacob had sent his family and servants ahead to meet his twin brother Esau, along with his best livestock to be given as a peace offering. Left alone in the night, Jacob met...
Details: Photo taken during the last day of the Second World Congress of Divine Mercy at the Shrine in Łagiewniki. 🙏🏽Please give proper attribution. "Kapłani z Czarnego Lądu" flickr photo by DrabikPany https://flickr.com/photos/drabikpany/6570528163 shared under a Creative Commons (BY) license. Free Download Please...
Details: For about a thousand years, in obedience to interpretations of specific Bible passages, pictorial depictions of God in Western Christianity had been avoided by Christian artists. At first only the Hand of God, often emerging from a cloud, was portrayed. Gradually, portrayals of the head and later the whole...
Details: This scene is the moving conclusion of the story of Tobias, the young man at the right. It addresses the themes of family devotion and trust. Tobias’s father sent him on a long journey to retrieve family money. The angel Raphael appeared as a relative, offering the traveler...
Details: The original owner of this exquisite book of hours was Queen Isabella of Spain, who sponsored Christopher Columbus's exploratory voyage to the Americas. Eventually this book found its way to the New World and was acquired by the Cleveland Museum of Art in 1963. Isabella’s book...
Details: An angel is a supernatural spiritual being who, according to various religions, is God's servant. Abrahamic religions often depict angels as benevolent celestial intermediaries between God and humanity. Other roles include protectors and guides for humans, and servants of God. Abrahamic religions describe angelic hierarchies, which vary...
Details: Gutenberg's Bible appeared in 1455. The first book to combine his invention with printed illustrations appeared in 1463. At about the same time, perhaps a little earlier or a little later, a different kind of printed illustrated book-the blockbook-began to appear. Gutenberg's catered to a...
Details: The theme of the holy kinship, represented in the central medallion, was based on an apocryphal account of the three marriages of Saint Anne, mother of the Virgin. It was one of the many themes that developed in the visual arts as a result of the controversy over the...
Details: The Assumption of Mary is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church, and holds that the Virgin Mary "having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory". The Assumption of Mary was celebrated in the West under...
Details: The Book of Tobit (/ˈtoʊbɪt/) is a 3rd or early 2nd century BCE Jewish work describing how God tests the faithful, responds to prayers, and protects the covenant community (i.e., the Israelites). It tells the story of two Israelite families, that of the blind Tobit in Nineveh and...
Details: This casket is a rare, if not unique example of high-quality woodcarving from Anglo-Saxon England. Decorated with scenes from Christ’s life, it was likely made for an ecclesiastical purpose and may have housed relics. On one long side, the Christ child rests in the manger. Above, the Crucifixion...
Details: This engraving is part of the Tarocchi group marked with the letter “A”, and named Firmaments of the Universe. This series comprises the seven planets from the classical astronomy (Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn) and the three celestial spheres that separate them from the Supreme Entity (Prima...
Details: Cavallino worked in Naples where he was not well known during his lifetime, but was alert to the work of contemporaries whose innovations he transformed with extraordinary delicacy and charm. The adoration of the shepherds is a traditional subject, but here Cavallino shows it in a new light. The...
Details: This Tympanum (a decorative wall surface over an entrance) was commissioned by Petronilla of Lorraine, wife of Count Floris II of Holland for the Saint Benedictine monastery of Egmond. The piece contains 3 persons: in the middel stands Saint Peter. At the right is Petronilla and at the left...
Details: This is an image from the play Lucifer. It is an influential and controversial work by Joost van den Vondel (1587-1679), the colossus of Dutch literature, regarded as a major influence on Milton’s Paradise Lost. In the story, Lucifer returns from Eden, his wings singed by the beauty...
Details: This illuminated manuscript of the Four Gospels was created at a monastic center in northern Ethiopia. Twenty full-page paintings depict scenes from the life of Christ and four portraits of the evangelists introduce the respective Gospel texts. The New Testament was translated from Greek into Geez, the classical language...
Details: This rare chasuble decorated with angels, musicians, pomegranates, and flowers represents Sacred and Profane Love. This is indicated by two figures—a clear-sighted figure embracing a blindfolded figure—standing on a globe in the upper center and also by the musicians. The angels play soft-sounding instruments (harpsichords, harps, viole...
