Saint Mary Magdalen
Bartolomeo Vivarini
(Italian (Venetian), active about 1440, died after 1500)
about 1480-90
Medium/TechniqueTempera on panel
Dimensions56.83 x 36.0 cm (22 3/8 x 14 1/6 in.)
Credit LineGift of Louis Agassiz Shaw
Accession number1991.691
On View
On viewClassificationsPaintings
Collections
Holding a book against her chest, Mary Magdalen gazes down at an ointment jar in her right hand, a symbol of her devotion to Christ. On Easter morning, she visited the tomb of Jesus to anoint his body. Mary was also identified with a woman in the gospels who applied perfumed ointment to Jesus’s feet during a banquet, a gesture both intimate and humble. Now housed in a reproduction frame, this painting was once part of a multi-paneled altarpiece.
ProvenanceBy 1888, Quincy Adams Shaw (b. 1825 - d. 1908), Boston [see note 1]; by descent to his grandson, Louis Agassiz Shaw (b. 1908 - d. 1990), Boston; 1991, gift of the estate of Louis Agassiz Shaw to the MFA. (Accession Date: November 20, 1991)
NOTES:
[1] The painting is mentioned as being in the Quincy Adams Shaw collection by F. Harck, "Aus amerikansichen Galerien," Repertorium für Kunstwissenschaft XI (1888): p. 79, where it is attributed to Alvise Vivarini and dated to about 1490.
NOTES:
[1] The painting is mentioned as being in the Quincy Adams Shaw collection by F. Harck, "Aus amerikansichen Galerien," Repertorium für Kunstwissenschaft XI (1888): p. 79, where it is attributed to Alvise Vivarini and dated to about 1490.
Fra Carnevale (Bartolomeo di Giovanni Corradini)
about 1467
Unidentified artist, Russian (Palekh School), 18th century
Unidentified artist, Greek (Veneto-Cretan), 16th century
Argonaut Master
last third of the 15th century
Master of the Bracciolini Chapel
1420s
