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Virgin and Child
Jan Gossart (Netherlandish, c. 1478–1532)
c. 1520
- Medium
- Oil on panel
- Classification
- Painting
- Dimensions
- 53.4 × 40.2 cm (21 × 15 7/8 in.); Framed: 63.5 × 49.5 × 5.7 cm (25 × 19 1/2 × 2 1/4 in.)
- Culture
- Netherlands
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago, Painting and Sculpture of Europe
- Credit line
- Charles H. and Mary F. S. Worcester Collection
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed
View at the Art Institute of Chicago
About this work
The first Netherlandish painter known to have studied Classical sculpture in Rome, Jan Gossart here fused the vocabulary of the Italian Renaissance with a traditional Netherlandish diptych (two-panel) format. The Virgin Mary’s draperies and the child’s athletic figure show Gossart’s command of the new Renaissance style perfected by Italian artists Michelangelo and Raphael. The glance and blessing gesture of the infant Jesus are directed beyond the picture to the right, suggesting that the panel was once joined by another depicting a donor in prayer. Earlier Netherlandish patrons favored this construction of paired, hinged panels for portable altarpieces.
Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0
