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See how Mary and Joseph kneel on either side of the Child under the open shed, while shepherds come in from both edges and an angel flies in at the upper right.
This scene and the three others in this room come from a predella, the row of small pictures set beneath an altarpiece; a fifth, the Resurrection, is in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. The Art Institute of Chicago explains that each shows a moment when Christ’s divine nature was revealed, beginning with his birth. The main painting they once stood beneath has not been identified.
Tempera on panel, transferred to canvas · 26.2 × 46.3 cm · Art Institute of Chicago · Renaissance · High Renaissance and Mannerism
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Details and source
- Museum title
- The Nativity
- Artist
- Perugino (Pietro di Cristoforo Vannucci; Italian, 1445/46-1523)
- Date
- 1500–05
- Medium
- Tempera on panel, transferred to canvas
- Dimensions
- 26.2 × 46.3 cm (10 5/16 × 18 1/4 in.)
- Credit line
- Mr. and Mrs. Martin A. Ryerson Collection
- Image license
- CC0 1.0 · Public domain
- Museum record
- Art Institute of Chicago
Renaissance c. 1300–1600
View in the AtlasGaller’s rooms and hanging scale are imagined. The image is the museum’s original digital reproduction.