The Sleeping Christ Child

The MFA has purchased more European paintings by women in the last three years than in the preceding three decades. This very small picture on copper fills a large gap. Artemisia Gentileschi was one of the most important artists working in 17th-century Italy. The painting is signed, “Arte. GentilescA / fecit Napo,” emphasizing two aspects of the artist’s identity: her gender and her geographic location. Gentileschi must have painted it soon after moving in 1630 to Spanish-controlled Naples, where she spent most of the rest of her life. While the artist is well known for her large canvases depicting biblical or mythological heroines, cabinet pictures on expensive supports constitute an under-recognized facet of her production. Documents reveal that she made small works on copper throughout her career, but this is only the third to emerge. Prior to the painting’s appearance in a French estate sale in 2015, this sensitive portrayal of the sleeping baby Jesus was known only from early engravings that credited the composition to Gentileschi.