Day 196 - Giovanni di Paolo Adoration of the Magi

October 10, 2019

Gallery 537 contains paintings and statuettes from the 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries. Beyond that, there is considerable diversity in the items on display. While most come from Italy, there are also statuettes from France and Germany and paintings from Spain and the Netherlands. The statuettes have both religious and classical themes; the paintings include both religious subjects (many Madonnas, a number of crucifixions) and portraits. 

We learn in intro art history classes that classical mythology offered sculptors and painters a rationale for depicting nudes. On the basis of the evidence in this gallery, Hercules was a popular subject, offering many opportunities to portray a well-muscled male struggling with a lion, a boar, or a human. There's also a notable statuette of Bacchus accompanied by a panther who sits rather placidly at the god's feet,  apparently begging for a bunch of grapes that Bacchus holds in his left hand above the animal.  Bacchus' right arm, in contrast, is stretched over his head; the graceful, sensual,  languid pose accentuates the god's well-formed body.  Not all the nude statuettes are as appealing. A couple of German statuettes of Venus, one of boxwood and the other of bronze, look surprisingly awkward to me. 

It's useful to be reminded, too, that religious paintings could also depict nude or nearly-nude figures. The Christ child conventionally appears as an unclothed, rather chubby baby seated on his mother's lap; But I'm also struck by a couple of paintings that show the Virgin proffering her bare breast to the child. Nothing in the least disguised about the act. (In another painting, Leda offers her breast to the swan - as if birds drank milk!) I smile at the  ungainliness of St. Lawrence in an Austrian painting from around 1465. The saint is shown on his grill, wearing only a scanty Speedo-type bottom; his large head and barrel chest seem too large for the rest of him.

Today's object is a tempera- and gold-on-wood painting of the Adoration of the Magi by Giovanni di Paolo, who executed it in Siena around 1465. I very much like the combination of fine detail and intimacy in this small work (perhaps 11 inches on a side), and the way that the painting represents the Biblical text. The manger is shown topped by a roof of rough-hewn beams; an ox and an ass occupy the leftmost quarter of the painting. Nearer the center, Joseph and Mary flank an infant Jesus. who raises his right hand in benediction and touches the head of the oldest of the Magi with his left hand. The clothes that the three Magi wear appear to be richly textured, in contrast with Mary's plain blue robe. (Of course, if that blue pigment was created using lapis lazuli, it would have cost a mint.) I note that the Magi are of different ages, but the idea of showing Magi of different races hasn't yet taken hold, it seems. In the distance, a shepherd stands on a terraced hill keeping watch over his flocks, although not, apparently, by night. The whole scene is very tender. I assume from its size that it was a private devotional object. If it were mine, I would contemplate it with pleasure, even though it wouldn't  inspire religious belief.