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Your galleryThe Nativity with the Dream of Joseph
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Find the angel leaning over the sleeping Joseph at upper left, the ox’s head below him and the Child lying at Mary’s knees.
On a sheet less than nine centimeters tall, Parmigianino combined two moments: Mary kneels in prayer over the newborn Christ, while an angel comes to Joseph in a dream. He drew in brown and black ink and wash and added highlights in lead white, which has oxidized. The drawing belonged to Peter Lely and to Jonathan Richardson the Elder, two collectors in London.
pen and brown and black ink and brush and brown wash, with traces of brush and black wash, heightened with lead white (oxidized) · Sheet: 8.6 x 7.5 cm · Cleveland Museum of Art · High Renaissance and Mannerism
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Details and source
- Museum title
- The Nativity with the Dream of Joseph
- Artist
- Parmigianino (Italian, 1503–1540)
- Date
- c. 1527/30?
- Medium
- pen and brown and black ink and brush and brown wash, with traces of brush and black wash, heightened with lead white (oxidized)
- Dimensions
- Sheet: 8.6 x 7.5 cm (3 3/8 x 2 15/16 in.); Secondary Support: 14.9 x 13.4 cm (5 7/8 x 5 1/4 in.)
- Credit line
- Dudley P. Allen Fund
- Image license
- CC0 1.0 · Public domain
- Museum record
- Cleveland Museum of Art
Artist’s life 1503–1540
View in the AtlasGaller’s rooms and hanging scale are imagined. The image is the museum’s original digital reproduction.