Free downloadable Catholic paintings which are in the public domain
Details: According to Catholic teaching, each person is assigned a guardian angel at birth to guide and protect them throughout their life. The angel's presence is often felt as a comforting presence during times of fear or danger. They are believed to intercede on our behalf and provide...
Details: These panels reproduce the upper two tiers of the screen (known as the iconostasis) that separates the nave from the altar in Orthodox churches. Such sets, of which this is one of the earliest known, were used by priests for makeshift altars and by lay people for personal prayer....
Details: In this full-page portrait, John the Evangelist is depicted as having already copied John 1:1-2. It is a leaf from a large Ethiopian Gospel Book that was made in the first half of the sixteenth century and is written in Gǝ‛ǝz, the traditional liturgical language of the...
Details: An impressive eight-line initial represents a kneeling David praying before an altar amid stylized topiaries and set against a burnished gold ground. The text introduces Psalm 101: Domine exaudi orationem meam (Hear my prayer, O Lord, and let my crying come unto thee). Facial types for the figures are...
Details: The prayer for the deceased. In a death chamber, a young woman kneels before a crucifix between two burning candles. In the middle, behind curtains, is the bed where the body of the deceased person lies under a sheet. A crucifix is placed on the bed. On the left,...
Details: The newborn Christ lies swaddled in a manger and reaches toward his mother, the Virgin Mary, while Joseph sits nearby. The resemblance of Christ's manger to a Gothic tomb poignantly signals his eventual sacrifice. Above, God the Father extends a banderole reading, "You are my son,...
Details: This panel was painted on the Greek island of Crete, once part of the Byzantine Empire, and reflects the Post-Byzantine style that prevailed among the island's artists during the 15th century. The Christ Child lies in a manger while the Virgin Mary kneels in veneration. Joseph sits...
Details: This rare double-sided icon was most likely commissioned by Tsar Boris Godunov (r. 1598-1605) as a gift for a church in Jerusalem, where it was kept until the mid-20th century. It would have been displayed for veneration on the feast days of the Virgin's Presentation in the...
Details: The Evangelist is depicted as having already copied Lk. 1:1-2. This large Ethiopian Gospel Book was made in the first half of the sixteenth century and is written in Ge'ez, the traditional liturgical language of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Containing eleven full-page miniatures, six canon tables,...
Details: DID YOU KNOW? The images and decorated initials in the book helped users navigate to sections they needed while also offering details to provoke meditation and prayer, leading to books of hours sometimes being referred to as “painted prayers.” DESCRIPTION The style of this miniature, with its oval faces,...
Details: This panel originally formed the right half of a diptych, a hinged two-paneled painting used for private worship. The missing left panel probably depicted the Virgin and Child. The entire composition showed the monk, with his prayer book open, kneeling in an interior before Mary and the infant Jesus....
Details: The Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph consecrated the baby Christ to God in the Temple of Jerusalem 40 days after his birth, in accordance with Jewish laws concerning purity and firstborn sons. Joseph brings a sacrifice of doves, the priest Simeon receives Christ on an altar, and the prophetess...
Details: The arrest of Jesus was a pivotal event in Christianity recorded in the canonical gospels. Jesus, a preacher whom Christians believe to be the Son of God, was arrested by the Temple guards of the Sanhedrin in the Garden of Gethsemane. It occurred shortly after the Last Supper (during...
This majestic painting was created for a large iconostasis, a screen separating the altar sanctuary from the nave in Orthodox churches. Here, Abraham and Sarah sacrifice a calf to honor their guests, who reveal themselves as angels (Genesis 18:1-10). Christian theologians interpreted the three angels as Old Testament precursors...
Details: Tanner painted The Annunciation soon after returning to Paris from a trip to Egypt and Palestine in 1897. The son of a minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, Tanner specialized in religious subjects, and wanted to experience the people, culture, architecture, and light of the Holy Land. Influenced...
Jacobo Kyushei Gorobioye Tomonaga was a Japanese Dominican priest who was born in 1582 and became a catechist after studying with the Jesuits. He later joined the Dominican Order, was ordained a priest in 1626, and served as a missionary in Taiwan and Japan during the period of Christian persecution....
The smaller fragment (37.2751C) shows Christ as High Priest clad in episcopal vestments, blessing the bishop saints Basil of Caesarea, John Chrysostom (37.2751A), Gregory of Nazianzus, and Nicholas (37.2751B). The three pieces, now separate, once formed part of a two-winged door in the center of an iconostasis,...
This large Ethiopian Gospel Book was made in the first half of the sixteenth century and is written in Ge'ez, the traditional liturgical language of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Containing eleven full-page miniatures, six canon tables, and five elaborately ornamented harags, or headpieces, this manuscript represents the golden...
The adoration by the shepherds. Two shepherds stand together with Mary and Joseph around the manger with the Christ child. In the background, antique ruins. On either side and below the image, a prayer in letterpress. 🙏🏽This image is in the public domain. Free Download RP-P-OB-200.042 (1).jpg 6...
In 1793, the National Convention of France ordered the destruction of the ancient royal tombs at St-Denis as a punishment for the vanity of the deposed "tyrants" and to erase their memory. The Bourbon kings were buried in a vault in the crypt, called the Bourbon vault, in...
The dead Christ hangs from the Cross, haloed and crowned with thorns. Blood issues from the wounds in his hands, feet, and side, where Roman soldiers pierced him with a lance. To either side stand his mother, the Virgin Mary, and his favorite disciple, John the Evangelist, to whom he...
Clovis II was a king of the Franks who ruled from 634 to 657 AD. He was a member of the Merovingian dynasty and the son of King Dagobert I. Like his father, Clovis II was a Catholic monarch who supported the Church and its institutions. During his reign, he...
Dagobert I ruled the Frankish kingdom from 629 to 634 AD, and during his reign, he actively supported the Catholic Church. He founded several monasteries and churches and is said to have been a generous patron of the clergy. Dagobert I also played a role in the spread of Christianity...
Abelard and Héloïse were two individuals who lived in the 12th century and are known for their tragic love story. Abelard was a Catholic philosopher and theologian, while Héloïse was his student and later became his lover. Their relationship was scandalous at the time, as Abelard was a respected scholar...
