Lent 34

You may be thinking, ‘We are there too soon,’ but part of the function of Lent is the preparation for the inevitable. It is a period of self-denial, of prayer and of repentance, but we have all given up so much over the last year, we are all living within such restricted circles, that I am not convinced that we need to do any more. But for Christians this is a time in which prayer and contemplation is specifically about Christ’s sacrifice, so the Crucifixion would be remembered daily. It could even be considered odd that this is the first time we have seen the crucified Christ, given that we have already arrived at day 34 of my Lenten discipline. As I’m sure you know, there are forty days in Lent, reflecting Jesus’s forty days in the wilderness, and just in case you were wondering, given that we are at day 34, how this could possibly last until Easter – which is just under two weeks away – I should point out that the forty days of Lent last for 46 days. But I will explain that in detail next week!

Jesus is crucified as we would expect – and as we have learnt to expect from all the images we have seen of him in the past. A nail has been driven through the palm of each hand, and, however physiologically impossible that would be, it was the tradition and not to be altered. There is no sense of the weight of the body, the pull on the arms which could dislocate the shoulders, the lifting of the rib-cage which eventually causes suffocation. You could argue that there is nothing too unbearable to look on, or we would avoid it altogether – but there are other traditions that do not shy away from the anguish, from the extreme suffering, or from the grotesque, even. You could equally argue that this portrayal is a sign of Christ’s inevitable triumph over his suffering, and then, over death. We see now, given that it was not clear in Lent 32, that his chest has already been wounded, as described in John 19:33-34,

But when they came to Jesus, and saw that he was dead already, they brake not his legs: But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water.

Whatever the physiological explanation for this phenomenon might be, the blood is, of course, the blood shed for us, which is commemorated during the celebration of the Mass, as instituted at the Last Supper, whereas the water can be seen as the water of life, the promise of life everlasting, as mentioned, for example, in the Book of Revelation 21:6,

And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.

However, the painting contradicts the verses from John. They say that his chest was not pierced until after he had died – and yet he appears to be still alive, and suffering, in this painting. But think back to all of the images of the Crucifixion you have seen: they always include the wound to the chest, whether Christ is alive or dead. That is because, on the whole, images of the Crucifixion are not illustrations of a specific point of the narrative, but the result of a long evolution which means that they can encompass the entire story – the entirety of Christ’s suffering.

An essential part of this passion – which means ‘suffering’ – is the crown of thorns, originally thrust onto his head when he was mocked as ‘King’, as described in John 19:2-3,

And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and put it on his head, and they put on him a purple robe, And said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they smote him with their hands.

This was mockery which aimed to hurt both mentally and physically, but although the purple robe was removed, the crown remained. We saw it atop the Scala Santa (Lent 15) and on the Via Crucis (Lent 22).  Now, still wearing the crown, and underneath the sign saying ‘Jesus of Nazareth the King of the Jews,’ it confirms his kingship, and his reign over suffering, and over death. Around his head the clouds gather (Matthew 27:45):

Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour.

Lent 33

We have done exactly as I said we would – we have looked up, beyond the cross even, to the inscription attached to the top. If I think back over all of the years talking about art, the question I have been asked most often is, in all probability, ‘What does that say?’. Which surprises me. Well, it is the direct result of something mentioned in all four gospels, but which is described most thoroughly in John 19:19-22

And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was Jesus Of Nazareth The King Of The Jews. This title then read many of the Jews: for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city: and it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin. Then said the chief priests of the Jews to Pilate, Write not, The King of the Jews; but that he said, I am King of the Jews. Pilate answered, What I have written I have written.

So this is ‘a title’, or in Latin, titulus – which is the word for any label, caption, or inscription, especially those naming figures or subjects in art. To clarify, then, this is the titulus crucis. It tells you who is on the cross – Jesus of Nazareth the King of the Jews, or, in Latin Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum, abbreviated here to I.N.R.I. – the dashes above each letter tell you that they are abbreviations.

Now, John says that ‘it was written in Hebrew, and Greek, and Latin,’ although most artists only include the Latin abbreviation. However, there were some, with learned connections – i.e. their patrons were either scholars or priests, or had advisors who were – who included all three languages. However, relatively few artists would have had Latin, even, so they must have had the texts written out for them to be copied onto the paintings. One example is in Fra Angelico’s Descent from the Cross painted between 1432 and 1434 for the church of Santa Trinità in Florence. It was initially commissioned from Lorenzo Monaco – ‘Lawrence the Monk’ – who had completed the pinnacles before his death (c. 1425), and so it was fitting that  Fra Angelico – ‘Brother Angelic’ – should take over. Both were Dominican friars, and so had access to some of the most learned scholars in Florence – i.e. their fellow Dominicans. The painting has made its way to the Museo di San Marco, effectively the Fra Angelico museum, housed in the monastery in which he and his workshop decorated all of the cells – including illustrations taken from De Modo Orandi which I mentioned yesterday. I’m afraid the detail isn’t clear, but it’s proved very hard to track it down!

Lorenzo Monaco and Fra Angelico, Descent from the Cross, before 1425 and 1432-34. Museo di San Marco, Florence.

The Jews objected to this wording because, for them, he wasn’t ‘King of the Jews’. They accused him of saying that he was, and this was his ‘crime’, according to them – even though Jesus didn’t claim the title for himself. In Mark 15:2,

Pilate asked him, Art thou the King of the Jews? And he answering said unto them, Thou sayest it.

It’s hardly an admission. When, in John 18:33, Pilate asks him the same question, his response, in verse 36, is ‘My kingdom is not of this world.’ In a similar way in which Pilate washes his hands of the responsibility for Christ’s death, he ends up refusing to confront the possible implications of the choice of words, resorting to ‘I have written what I have written.’ Whatever the historical Pilate was like, the character of the biblical version is both rich and complex.

You may remember that it was/is believed that St Helena had brought the steps of the Praetorium (Pilate’s palace) back to Rome (Lent 16), and that they are now known as the Scala Santa. Well, another of the relics that came with them was the titulus crucis, which she gave to the Church of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, founded by the Empress herself around 325 CE. Apparently, it’s still there! Although it went missing for a long, long time, its rediscovery in 1492, by a Spanish priest, on the very day that news arrived from Spain about its delivery from the Moor, was in itself seen as miraculous.

The titulus crucis and a transcription

It has been analysed by any number of experts in palaeography (the study of writing systems) who have all dated it to some time in the 1st to 3rd or 4th Centuries, with most of them preferring the 1st Century. Although it’s very hard to read, the first line is mostly destroyed, and the Greek and Latin are written backwards (maybe the ‘scribe’ was Jewish and used to writing right to left – would a forger think of that?), many people are convinced it is the real thing. OK, so radio-carbon dating suggests it was made some time between 980 and 1146. As the Cardinal Bishop of the church between 1124 and 1144 had sealed it in a box – the one in which it was found in 1492 – then you could argue that he was responsible for its production. It could, of course, be a copy of the original… For now, I shall leave you to ponder on it, knowing, at least, that it is there.

Lent 32

By now, we know which side we stand, but at the foot of the cross it is not so simple. Proximity is always a good thing, but it doesn’t mean that you are good, just because you are there. Three people take their places, looking up towards Jesus. Their attitudes are completely different, but abundantly clear, the result of the Master of Delft’s wonderful capacity to capture body language and expression. As more than one of you has pointed out, this painting verges on the cartoonish fairly often – but the more exaggerated someone appears, the less we should respect them. If we remember that a civilised member of society would conduct themselves with a measured demeanour, any exaggerated gesture – excessive pointing (which is rude anyway), waving, or grimacing would not be seen as gentlemanly or ladylike. The excesses of extreme grief could be forgiven, perhaps.

This detail embodies to perfection three completely different responses to exactly the same situation. Two are biblical in origin, the third, part of church lore. The last of these is the appearance and response of Mary Magdalene. We have seen her before, in Lent 24, and indeed, we can see the trepidacious supporters at the top left of this detail. The Magdalene adopts the same posture, to the extent that her headdress even enjoys the same breeze. Inevitably there is more detail, notably in the rich gold brocade of her dress, revealed by the belt, which holds up the hem of her red overdress, and by the latter’s full, slashed sleeves. She links her thumbs in much the same way as the donor (Lent 25) – I don’t know if this is a mannerism of the artist, or contemporary religious practice. Maybe I should look up De Modo Orandi – ‘About the Ways of Praying’ – although as this was a 13th century text about St Dominic’s prayer regime it is probably not relevant here.

On the other side are two soldiers – one has fallen down onto his left knee, and looks up in awe with a longing gesture, the other bends backwards, hip thrust out, pointing and sticking his tongue out just like the mocking man from Lent 8 – a standard form of disrespect, it would seem. I think they are illustrations of specific texts. The kneeling man is undoubtedly the ‘centurion’ mentioned by Matthew (27:54), Mark (15:29) and Luke (23:47). This is Mark:

And when the centurion, which stood over against him, saw that he so cried out, and gave up the ghost, he said, Truly this man was the Son of God.

That newly found belief is apparent in every limb of his body, the tilt of his head, and the open, breathing mouth – he is ‘inspired’, or ‘breathed into’. The other soldier, though, is his opposite – all ineffectual menace and mockery. I think this characterisation is derived from Matthew 27:39-40,

And they that passed by reviled him, wagging their heads, And saying, Thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days, save thyself. If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross.

He is holding a halberd – a medieval weapon that looks like a cross between an axe and a spear. Of course, there was a soldier present with a spear, as we know from John 19:34,

But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water.

From the detail we cannot tell if this has happened yet – but I do not think that this disreputable man is the one to do it. In the apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, which I mentioned yesterday, the soldier responsible for piercing Christ’s side is named as Longinus – a Latinised form of the Greek word for ‘lance’ – and is said to be the very centurion who utters the words of belief from Mark 15:29 that I quoted above. He was said to have converted to Christianity, and was eventually canonised as a saint. Before the reforms of the Roman Catholic calendar in 1969, his feast day was 15 March. I’m sorry, we failed to celebrate last week, so we will have to wait until 16 October, which is the ‘new’ official date. His journeys took him as far as Mantua (according to the Mantuans), where he left a relic of the Holy Blood, and the head of the lance somehow made its way to St Peter’s, where it has been since the 15th Century. Bernini carved a remarkable sculpture of Longinus for the crossing of the basilica, 4.4 m high, and just as wide, a result of his baroque gesture of astonishment. I do believe that this is him kneeling, although, as yet, he has no lance.

The mocking soldier is truly grotesque when seen up close, his eyes bulging, with the thumb apparently pulling down an eyelid (when done with the forefinger, for the Italians this is a gesture warning you to keep an eye on someone – I don’t know about the Netherlands in the 16th Century, though). It has that same sense of the obscene that we saw back in Lent 8, a finger thrust into the grimacing mouth, and that nasty combination of finger and tongue. The echo of the heavy brow and pointed nose doesn’t help either. Meanwhile Mary Magdalene is all pale and repentant, tearful and humble. Her mouth is at precisely the right level to kiss Christ’s feet, the part of his body with which she had been associated since her first putative appearance in the bible.

She is first mentioned by name in Luke 8:2,

And certain women, which had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom went seven devils…

Immediately before this, in Luke 7:37-38, Christ is at dinner, and the following happens:

And, behold, a woman in the city, which was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at meat in the Pharisee’s house, brought an alabaster box of ointment, And stood at his feet behind him weeping, and began to wash his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment.

There is nothing to say that this ‘sinner’ was Mary Magdalene, but in 591 Pope Gregory I said that they – together with Mary, sister of Martha and Lazarus – were one and the same, and thus they remained until 1969. For 1378 years Mary Magdalene was seen as a penitent sinner, with no biblical authority whatsoever (although there are other circumstantial reasons for eliding the three women, but I will leave that for another day). As Luke’s ‘sinner’ wept, washed ‘his feet with tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment,’ Mary Magdalene has been associated with tearfulness, ointment, hair, and Christ’s feet ever since – hence the position of her head in this detail. She has no ointment just now, but hair and tears are flowing. She was, indeed, maudlin – the same word as Magdalene – and yes, that’s why Oxbridge alumni can’t pronounce the name as it is spelt. You will hear speak of Maudlin College in both Oxford and Cambridge. Miserable bunch, as I remember! Still – like her, things are now looking up for us in our current woes, and tomorrow that is precisely what we shall do: look up.

Lent 31

I can’t believe it’s a year since I started this blog – more on that below, but if you want to celebrate this anniversary by reading, or re-reading (if you’ve been with me all that time) the first entry, it was Day 1 – The Rape of Europa. But for now, I want to concentrate on The Good Thief. Did you know he had a name? Both of them do, as it happens – Dismas and Gestas (for the Good and the Bad).  The names come from the Gospel of Nicodemus, an apocryphal text which reached its ‘finished’ form at some point in the fourth century, although some elements may have an even earlier origin. The names recur in the 13th Century in the Golden Legend, although Jacobo da Voragine, the author, gives the Bad Thief’s name as Gesmas.

In the same way that I did yesterday, I’m going to ask, ‘How do I know’ that this is the Good Thief? Well, he is at Christ’s right hand (so, the side of the Blessed), and above the Good (the Virgin, John, and the Holy Women are just below him, although I have left no evidence of that in the detail I have picked out for today). He is also associated with Christ and with the Church: in the background we can see Jesus on the Via Crucis and the New Church in Delft. Although Dismas is contorted – a sign of his guilt, and of his repentance, perhaps – his back arches and his head tilts upwards – and so he faces heaven. He also has good weather… However, we can also see the post-suicidal Judas to the right. Maybe this implies that by taking his own life we know that Judas was repentant, and this, at least, could be considered ‘good’? I don’t know. As Hamlet says ‘the Everlasting… fix’d his cannon ’gainst self-slaughter,’ and surely two wrongs don’t make a right. But Judas must be there for a reason, and it is something along these lines. Maybe, at least, it is that ‘Justice’ is being done.

The text I quoted yesterday, in which Dismas admits that he and Gestas have done wrong, continues like this (Luke 23:42-43):

And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom. And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.

There is a problem here, as Jesus could not have seen him in paradise that day. To quote the Apostle’s Creed, he

…was crucified, dead, and buried.
He descended into Hell; the third day He rose again from the dead;
He ascended into Heaven… 

It would be quite some time until he got to paradise. Maybe the problem is with the punctuation in the King James Version. Move the comma, and swap two words round, and it reads, ‘Verily I say unto thee Today, thou shalt be with me in paradise’ – which would work. However, I have just checked a parallel text website, and every single version (in English) implies that they would be in paradise that very same day. But then, as God, and the Heavenly Kingdom, are outside time, maybe that is actually possible.

Like the Bad Thief, Dismas has the nails driven through his wrists, with his feet tied rather than nailed. This last detail is quite common. Both features probably derive from the will to make Jesus unique – no one else should be seen as dying in exactly the same way. That was why Peter chose to be crucified upside-down, according to church tradition (…but not the bible): he didn’t think himself worthy to die in the same way as Christ. Dismas, like Gestas, also wears a pouch with the thinnest of ties. Crucifixion was a humiliating form of execution – the very reason why the early Christians did not use it as a symbol for centuries – and for the thieves it is made even more humiliating, as a result of their degrading state of undress.  

And another intriguing detail: the Good Thief has his right wrist nailed so that the palm of his hand is showing – like any other crucifixion – whereas his left hand is twisted round, so that the back of the hand is visible. I only noticed this yesterday. Maybe it is a frequent feature of Netherlandish art, but I have never seen it in any other painting. I will have to start looking. I can’t imagine what the reason for it might be. For now, I will just point out that it puts his hands into the same configuration that Christ’s adopt in so many images of the Last Judgement: raising with the right hand, and condemning with the left. This parallel with Jesus would certainly confirm his status as ‘Good’, but it seems to go a bit far… I must do some research!

The world has had a truly dreadful year, I know – but the last paragraph is an illustration of one thing that has been good about it, for me at least: I’ve learnt so much, given the time to look at paintings, to think about them, and then, to clarify my thoughts by writing. So thank you for giving me a reason to do this! And special thanks to those of you who have been along for the ride since Day 1. For those who haven’t, I started the ‘Picture of the Day’ on my Facebook page, and only migrated to this blog some weeks later. I had no idea where we were going – none of us did – but I wound down ‘Picture of the Day’ after 100 days just as we were coming out of lockdown, and museums were re-opening. Back then none of us knew (we really should have done) that we would go into lockdown again. And again. Once more, the signs are positive (I had my first jab this week!), and I am continuing to learn. So thank you all, for all of your support – first of all with this blog, and then with the latest thing I have ‘learnt’, which is how to work for myself! Which reminds me – it reminds me to remind you that my second series of talks, Michelangelo Matters, starts on Monday with The Development of David at 2pm and 6pm GMT – some details are on the diary page, and the links there will lead you through to Tixoom who deal with all the bookings, where there are longer descriptions of the three talks. I do hope some of you can join me. And after that – well, the third series has already been planned, but more about that another day. In the meantime, it’s still Lent. So – until tomorrow, enjoy the rest of your day!

Lent 30

We have seen the two thieves about to leave Jerusalem in Lent 19, and then leading the procession along the Via Crucis in Lent 21. Now we have caught up with them again – or at least, with one of them. The Gospel of Mark (15:27-28) explains why the thieves are there – or rather, tells us that their existence had been foretold:

And with him they crucify two thieves; the one on his right hand, and the other on his left. And the scripture was fulfilled, which saith, And he was numbered with the transgressors.

The ‘scripture’ quoted here is from the Book of Isaiah – just one phrase from verse 12 of chapter 53: the King James Version is careful to use exactly the same words both times. Luke (23:39-41) tells us more, and includes the following exchange:

And one of the malefactors which were hanged railed on him, saying, If thou be Christ, save thyself and us. But the other answering rebuked him, saying, Dost not thou fear God, seeing thou art in the same condemnation? And we indeed justly; for we receive the due reward of our deeds: but this man hath done nothing amiss.

Because the first is entirely unrepentant, and only out for what he can get, whereas the second is aware that he has done wrong, unlike Jesus, they become known as the Bad Thief and the Good Thief. It has nothing to do with their success in their chosen profession.

Today we have the Bad Thief. How do I know that? Well, he is above Pilate, the Chief Priests and their guards – the ‘Bad’ people, at Christ’s left hand. In addition, he has turned his back on us – and, by extension, on Jesus. Even so, we can see that his head has fallen – and so he looks down, towards hell, his inevitable destination. Not only that, but in the background, on either side of his feet, we see Judas and the rabble charged with arresting Christ – a bad act – and then, in the distance, Christ’s Agony in the Garden, which he should never have had to undergo. And there is more: we know that he is the Bad Thief, because he has Bad Weather. Somehow this seems banal, but it is undeniable. These are the dark and lowering clouds we saw way back in Lent 3, and they show the Master of Delft at his most resourceful. The clouds cast a doom-laden spell on the Garden of Gethsemane, while also echoing the ‘badness’ of this thief. Later, we will see that they also echo the words of Mark 15:33 (among others):

And when the sixth hour was come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth hour.

The darkness is at hand.

The structure of the cross is basic. Two slim tree trunks have been cut to the right length, with a section cut out of the vertical to allow the insertion of the horizontal, and two nails holding it in place. Two more nails, which protrude from our side of the wood, are used to hang the thief. Remarkably, I think – and I only noticed this when I started putting these details together – the nails have been driven through his wrists, not through the palms of his hands. As I’m sure you may know, a nail driven through the palm of the hand will not support the weight of the body, however unpleasant it might be to think about. Crucifixion can only work if the nails are driven between the radius, the ulna and the carpals – right through the ‘middle’ of the wrist bones. I was unaware that they knew this in the sixteenth century.

Having said that, the need for support was paramount, as there are no nails through the feet – they are simply tied in place. I have mentioned the clothes before – underpants at his first appearance, with a shirt and waistcoat added for the second. But now, at his death, the slimmest of threads suggest that his ‘modesty’ might just be intact. But otherwise, this is extremely humiliating. And yet, he is unrepentant.

Lent 29

I try to be optimistic, and I think today’s detail is. To the left, we can just see St John, supporting the Virgin’s arm, a detail we saw in full yesterday. On the right we see the uncouth man in his red top and hot pants, bells on the hem of his blue cape, about to strike one of the horses, who we saw in Lent 26. So, with The Good on our left and The Bad on our right, we must be in the middle, at the foot of the cross – maybe just to the left of centre, as the figure kneeling here is looking up to our right.

There are bones on the floor. Is that because this is a place of execution? Or is it, simply, because the bible mentions bones? Matthew, Mark and John give the place where this happened the same name, although Luke does not. This is what John 19:17 says – I quoted the first half of the verse some time back:

And he bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha.

So there are bones because this is ‘the place of a skull.’ Luke uses the term ‘Calvary’ – or at least, in the King James Version he does. But then, that is derived from the Latin for skull – or, at least, for Cranium. So all four mention a skull – although oddly there isn’t one here. I can see a bit of a femur, maybe, and a stone that I want to look like an animal’s skull – but I don’t think it is. Legend has it that the skull after which Golgotha was named belonged to Adam, and that, as part of the Divine Plan, Jesus was Crucified in exactly the same spot as the place where Adam had been buried many centuries before. But that’s another story.

The kneeling figure must be another of the ‘many women… which followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto him’ (Matthew 27:55), some of whom were present in Lent 27. She is definitely a woman ‘of substance’ – just look at her clothes. She wears a full-length, sleeveless, green overdress, lined with fur, over a full-sleeved, cloth-of-gold gown. The belt looks like solid gold, although it must be woven in some way, with gold medallions from which are hanging yet more gold ornaments. She has a large black hood with a gold tassel and its own relatively small cape, and a white headdress. We can hardly see any of her face, as she kneels intently looking up to the cross, her hands clasped in prayer very close to her chin. I would like to think that this is one of the ‘certain women… which ministered unto [Jesus] of their substance’ mentioned by Luke (8:2-3). If we saw Joanna in Lent 27, then this could be Susanna – or the other way around.

We also saw two boys in Lent 27, at the top of the detail. One was in pink and yellow, and one held a bow. The same description could be applied to today’s detail, although the clothing is not the same (but we’ve seen that happen before) and a different child holds the bow (it’s good to share…). They could be the same boys – another puzzle, and, as before, it doesn’t matter if we can’t resolve it. But when we saw the two lads watching the Via Crucis I did wonder if they were innocent onlookers, or if we were seeing more innocence lost. I hope this detail answers that question. As with so many of the other children in the painting they look more like small, scrawny adults, but that’s just the artist’s style. They wear what I imagine would be very expensive outfits for any child, and also have an unmeasurable sense of the exotic, with long, slashed sleeves, loosely gathered waists, delicate colours, and one has an oddly-cut hood. They walk across the foreground of the painting, trailing the bow, as if they didn’t have a care in the world. And yet both gesture to our left: that is the direction they both want to go. Maybe this implies that this is where, in the painting – and therefore ‘the world’ – they want to end up. They are walking away from The Bad – Pilate, the chief priests, et al – and towards The Good – the family and friends of Jesus. They are moving from Christ’s left hand to his right, from the side of the damned to the side of the blessed. I really do hope that this is a conscious choice, and that it really indicates where they want to ‘stand’ in terms of good and evil. As I say, I do try to be optimistic.

Lent 28

O vos omnes qui transitis per viam, attendite et videte si est dolor sicut dolor meus.

The words from the Book of Lamentations (1:12) seem particularly apt today. This is a standard translation, adapted from the King James Version:

All ye that pass by, behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow.

The book itself laments the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE, but this particular text was often sung in Holy Week. Here is a link to a recording of the Tudor Consort from 2003 – our century – singing the setting from 1585 – the same century as our painting – by Tomás Luis de Victoria.

It is still over ten days until Holy Week, but seeing the Virgin’s face, this text, and its use in the liturgy, instantly sprang to mind. Mary is in a state of complete collapse. Her legs have folded beneath her and her arms hang limp, even with John supporting her left elbow. Her blue robe and blue cloak look especially sombre, and, although her state of mind is clear, her disorder is oh-so-subtly hinted at by her cuffs – one folded back neatly, revealing a grey lining, the other at full length half covering her hand. On the left we see the gesture of the turbaned Mary, who you might remember from yesterday, indicating the Virgin’s sorrowful face, as she looks down compassionately towards her. We see the donor’s praying hands: he is beside her, the material of their cloaks overlapping on the floor. He is contemplating her sorrows as much as the suffering of Jesus.

Mary’s presence at the Crucifixion is attested by all four gospels, but the most important source for us is John 19:26-27. As elsewhere in the book, John appears to be describing himself as ‘the disciple… whom he loved:’

When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple standing by, whom he loved, he saith unto his mother, Woman, behold thy son! Then saith he to the disciple, Behold thy mother! And from that hour that disciple took her unto his own home.

Apart from any normal human decency, these verses explain the care that St John shows to the Virgin: Jesus has told them, from the cross, to look after one another, to adopt one another, even. Often they are shown standing symmetrically on either side of the cross, Mary to our left, John to our right (giving Mary the higher status), but here, where The Good and The Bad are divided between Christ’s right and left, we see them together – with The Good.

The pallor of Mary’s face is extreme, as is the sense that every feature collapses every bit as much as her body – the eyebrows, mouth and even chin. The eyelids collapse, half covering her eyes, which are full of tears. The white veil covers her head, and wraps around in front of her chest, but her hair is left free. Her status as perpetual virgin meant that her hair was not subject to the same strictures as that of other women. It is not always covered as that of a woman of marriageable age should be: she was beyond reproach, and beyond suspicion. And if the image as a whole reminds me of Lamentations, this hair, tumbling loose, and free, reminds me of one of Shakespeare’s most brilliant conceits, from one of his lesser known plays: King John, which was probably written a decade after the Victoria setting I linked to above. One of the characters, Constance, is the mother of young Arthur, who has been taken captive by King John – who is certain to kill him. Constance enters in Act 3, Scene 4 with her hair in disarray – she has let it down, loosed it from its ‘imprisonment’, in the same way that she wants Arthur freed from his. She later puts them – her hairs – up again, saying,

But now I envy at their liberty,
And will again commit them to their bonds,
Because my poor child is a prisoner.

This does not last long – despair overcomes her, as she utters one of the most penetrating descriptions of loss.

Grief fills the room up of my absent child,
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me,
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words,
Remembers me of all his gracious parts,
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form;
Then, have I reason to be fond of grief?
Fare you well. Had you such a loss as I,
I could give better comfort than you do.

At this point she lets her hair down again:

I will not keep this form upon my head
When there is such disorder in my wit.

I think this perfectly expresses the image of the Virgin Mary which we see today.

All ye that pass by, behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow.

Lent 27

At least one of the characters here looks up to our right – so they must be located to the left of the cross, under Jesus’s right hand: they are the good people, among the blessed, and the donor is somewhere in their company. We have seen at least three of them before. The man looking up is St John the Evangelist, with his long, uncovered hair, and no beard (he was the youngest of the apostles), and on the left are the two Maries, Mary Salome and Mary Zebedee. We saw them before in Lent 24, way off in the distance, watching the procession of the Via Crucis from the other side. The woman in the turban, to the left of centre, was kneeling and reaching out towards the Virgin, and she still seems to be caring – she looks down towards a veiled head with concern: it would be a good guess that this veil belongs to the mother of Jesus. A woman in purple on the far left turns away – it is all too much. She also has a white veil, and there is just a hint of a black collar – this is the other Mary, who was wringing her hands just next to the Virgin and St John when they were still afar off. But the woman raising her hands and looking towards us is new.

We can see Jesus passing in the background – his bare feet, and the skirts of the blue-grey robe. The Maries and John were on the far side before. I wanted to leave this part of the detail visible today to include the two children, who I didn’t have time to mention before when their heads appeared in Lent 22. More innocent onlookers? More innocence lost? I bring them up now, as these questions may soon be answered. The one on the left wears pink, with a yellow collar. The one on the right has a pink skull cap, grey clothes and a caramel-coloured collar, and holds a bow in his left hand. We’ll come back to them another day. To the right of them we see the rump of a white horse – I commented on its saddle in Lent 21.

Who is this new person? Her expression of grief is profound, with unfocussed eyes, red, and glinting with tears. The open mouth allows us to see her upper teeth and her tongue – is this a low keening, or an involuntary sob? Her hands are raised, but she seems helpless – that sense when you really don’t know what to do, and your hands themselves feel useless: like her eyes, perhaps, they are unfocussed. The grief of St John as he looks up is much the same. Their grief is for Christ, I think, whereas that of the turbaned Mary is for the Virgin. As for the identification of this apparently recent arrival, I’m sorry, but I can’t be precise. No one else is mentioned by name at the Crucifixion, aside from Luke’s comment (23:49) that,

…all his acquaintance, and the women that followed him from Galilee, stood afar off, beholding these things.

There are equivalents in the other two synoptic gospels, Matthew (27:55) even saying that,

 …many women were there beholding afar off, which followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering unto him.

So, she is one of the ‘many women… which followed Jesus’. We can at least glean the names of two of them from Luke 8:2-3,

And certain women, which had been healed of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary called Magdalene, out of whom went seven devils, And Joanna the wife of Chuza Herod’s steward, and Susanna, and many others, which ministered unto him of their substance.

Maybe this is Joanna, or Susanna, as I happen to know that the Magdalene is elsewhere. The fine clothes of all three women in this detail imply that they did indeed have ‘substance’ from which they could minister unto him.

What the Master of Delft is doing here is very clever, I think, and makes me wonder if he was aware of Alberti’s seminal De Pictura, written in the mid-1430s in Latin, then translated straight away into Italian as Della Pittura – ‘On Painting’. There are two ideas Alberti shares which are adopted in this detail – although that could, of course, be coincidence. The first is the fact that Joanna, or Susanna, looks out at us, as if she is seeking our sympathy, and inviting us to share in her grief. This is what Alberti says:

‘In a painting I like to see someone who admonishes and points out to us what is happening there; or beckons with his hand to see… or invites us to weep or to laugh together with them’

We are certainly being invited to weep together with this woman. The other quotation is concerned with ways in which artists can show differing degrees of grief, by referring to a classical image:

‘They praise Timanthes of Cyprus for the painting in which he… made Calchas sad and Ulysses even sadder at the sacrifice of Iphigenia, and [having] employed all his art and skill on the grief-stricken Menelaus, he could find no suitable way to represent the expression of her disconsolate father [Agamemnon]; so he covered his head with a veil, and thus left more for the onlooker to meditate on about his grief than he could see with the eye.”

That is exactly what is happening here. The turbaned Mary is sad, John is sadder, and Joanna, or Susanna, is perhaps saddest. On the far left, though, the Mary in purple is beyond even that, ‘so he covered [her] head with a veil,’ thus leaving more for us to meditate on about her grief. Sometimes, it seems, our imaginations are more powerful than the artist’s brush. It couldn’t get any worse than this, you would think. And yet… let us wait and see.

Lent 26

More onlookers today, but rather than sitting (or kneeling) outside the action, they play a greater part in the narrative. Some of them are those most responsible for Christ’s fate, others are merely those who make it happen, and most of them have appeared before. In the foreground is a man who I hope is the most recognisable. Seated upon a white horse, wearing a deep pink robe, with a green, patterned collar or cape is a man holding a long, slim staff. This is, of course, Pontius Pilate, just as we saw him outside his palace (Lent 14), and more or less as we saw him on the Via Crucis ­(Lent 22) – although in greater detail now, as he is far closer to us than before. He still wears the broad, dark hat, wrapped in a scarf, with the feather projecting straight upwards, and holds the long, slim staff. We can also see that his green cape is embroidered all over with diamonds, and the gold trims are sewn with pearls (and if you can’t see this here, you will, in the detail further down). Over Pilate’s shoulder we see the two men who were riding behind him, one with a broad-brimmed red hat, another with a smaller, ‘pill-box’ hat (although the last time we saw it, it was purple – indeed, his robes still are) and a high, plush, white, wrap-around collar. These two men lean in to each other, the one at the back resting his left hand on the other’s shoulder as a sign of complicity. The gesture and look of his companion makes me think that their scheme has come to fruition. They are the high priests, and they are ‘mocking him‘ as we shall see.

To the left of the group is a man on a brown horse (I know, you can hardly see it here) who makes a rhetorical gesture with his left hand, while looking to our right. He sports a slim, peaked hat, tied on with a band, a feather projecting at a sharp angle backwards. This is the man I mentioned in Lent 21 as having the same make of hat as someone in that detail: I wonder if they were meant to be the same man? Both are on brown horses, but the earlier equivalent had a crossbow: I can’t see that here. The earlier version was in a far more workaday grey outfit with a shield slung round his back – although he did make a similar rhetorical gesture. I can’t be sure if they are the same – and actually, in the end it doesn’t matter.

At the top right there are two guards. I think the one in the yellow turban may be new, but I think the other is the snub-nosed man with full silver-grey sleeves we first saw going away from us in Lent 16, only to see his red headdress with the front knot at the bottom of Lent 19, which had changed to yellow by Lent 22. One of the joys of this painting is that it becomes a puzzle to try and decipher, but I suspect that there is no solution. At least we know the lead players, even if the supporting cast are not so clear. But think about it: when you watch a film, how many of the people in the background do you actually identify or associate with? It is almost as if the artist’s workshop is using a limited number of players to fill out the crowd, using set types, but dressing them differently to make us think they are different people. There is also another man I think is new at the front left, with a red top and ‘hot pants’ (and we know what we think about them), boots but no hose, and a blue cape with bells on. He leans back, holding something in his right hand, as if he is about to beat one of the horses, a violent act which matches the guilt of this gathered assembly.

Why are these people here? Well, this is what it says in Matthew 27:39-43,

And they that passed by reviled him, wagging their heads, And saying, Thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days, save thyself. If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross. Likewise also the chief priests mocking him, with the scribes and elders, said, He saved others; himself he cannot save. If he be the King of Israel, let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe him. He trusted in God; let him deliver him now, if he will have him: for he said, I am the Son of God.

Mark and Luke say much the same, although the essence is encapsulated in one verse in Luke 23:35,

And the people stood beholding. And the rulers also with them derided him, saying, He saved others; let him save himself, if he be Christ, the chosen of God.

These are ‘the rulers‘, deriding, and, effectively, representatives of ‘the people‘ – although we shall see more of them in the coming days. We shall also see that John’s slightly different account is also relevant.

Pilate sits on his horse facing to our left, which suggests that he might be balancing the donor, who is kneeling and looking to our right on the other side of the painting. The two guards at the back look up and to our left. This tells us that they are all on the right of the painting, and to our right of the cross (hardly a ‘spoiler’ by now). To put it another way, they are at Jesus’s left hand. As in paintings of the Last Judgement (see, for example, Day 38 – Enrico Scrovegni) they are on the side of the damned. The donor was, therefore, to our left, or at Christ’s right hand: he is destined for Heaven. Tomorrow we will see the sort of company he keeps.

Lent 25

We were talking about anachronism just a couple of days ago (Lent 23), and if it seemed unlikely that the Via Crucis would skirt around a church, it is even less likely that it would pass someone who looks like a monk, as they came even later. He’s not a monk, as it happens, but we would be hard pressed to tell the difference these days. He kneels, in prayer, his hands joined in front of his waist, the thumbs rather charmingly crossed. Below the flared white sleeves is his white belt, with the end that has been fastened through the buckle wrapped around the main length to form a knot. It loosely gathers his long white robe, which is covered by an equally long white hooded cloak, parted at his chest by the praying hands. It lies over his right forearm, the subtle modulation of light and slightly-less-light revealing the precise position of his arm, then falls to the ground in elaborate folds.

He is not a monk, as he does not live a life of seclusion: he is a Premonstratensian canon, an order founded in Prémontré, near Laon, in 1120. His duties would have been to preach and carry out pastoral ministry in parishes not far from his abbey. In England they were known as the White Canons, and you can see why. But why would a Premonstratensian canon be kneeling in our painting? What role does he play? Well, if you look carefully, and consider the direction of his gaze, he is not playing a role at all.

When founded, the order was one of great austerity, imposing additional statutes to the Rule of St Augustine, which was strict enough already. We could have guessed as much from this portrait. He has a rather pinched face, with hollow cheeks, a long, thin, slightly hooked nose, and hollow eyes. The skin appears tight across the temples. He has been enjoying great austerity, I would say. The ragged haircut – possibly tonsured on top – shows his humility in the face of human vanity, and his look is one of total concentration on his devotions. Both his face and his torso are angled towards us ever so slightly, so that we can see him better, and as a result we can tell that he is looking straight ahead, focussed on something in the distance – or into the middle distance, as he focusses on his own contemplation.

All of this means that he is not involved in the action of the painting – he is not looking towards it, but rather, out, and away. He is thinking about it, even praying about it, but it is almost as if he is not there. Or even, as if the action of the painting is one big thought bubble. This is the portrait of a man thinking about, meditating upon, the passion of Christ. It is, of course, a donor portrait: this is the man who gave, or donated, money (hence ‘donor’) to have it painted. In other words, he is the patron of the painting. For many years there was no real idea as to who he might have been, but recently, I believe, it has been suggested that he could be Herman van Rossum, who was the provost of a convent in Koningsveld, near Delft, at the beginning of the 16th Century. Our painting would originally have been housed there, but, since the convent was all but destroyed in 1572 – presumably in the war with Spain – you will not be able to visit today. Below is a print which shows what the ruins looked like in 1680. As far as I can tell, it was just outside the city walls, not far from the position from which Vermeer painted his View of Delft (Lent 23), its place now taken by a 20th Century (?) housing estate.

Coenraet Decker, A View of the Ruins of Kongingsveld Cloister, 1680. Rijksmusem, Amsterdam.

This portrait of Herman van Rossum has offered us a moment of contemplation, a pause before we too contemplate the rest of the story. But his attitude tells us one way of responding to these events: the attitudes and behaviours of those present will also tell us how to respond, as we shall see in the next few days.

The origins of portraiture in Western art lie in images of donors, like the one we have seen today. They showed appearance, yes, character, sometimes, and in this case, belief. From this point onwards portraiture found many new forms, and rapidly left its sacred setting to find an increasing number of secular spaces. I will be talking about some truly wonderful examples from the 19th Century – created by some fabulous masters of the colour white, as it happens – this coming Wednesday, 17 March at 6pm GMT. If you are interested, and available, you can book via this link to the Art History Abroad website: Painting in Parallel – Sargent, Sorolla and Zorn.