The story of the conversion of the Magdalene represented here is not told in the Gospels, but is implied by her actions towards Christ. The work is based on a lost fresco by Federico Zuccaro formerly in the Grimani chapel in S. Francesco della Vigna, Venice, & datable to the early 1560s. The composition was modified to incorporate portraits, presumably of members of Grimani's family. The painting was mentioned in Grimani's will. ...

This early work was probably produced for a noble patron in Verona. There has been much debate over the subject matter; however, it is now generally believed that the painting shows the conversion of Mary Magdalene. Concerned for her sister's spiritual health, Martha takes Mary to the Temple to hear Jesus preach. Veronese shows Mary blushing with shame & sunk to her knees as she is overcome by Christ's words. Her fashionably low-cut dress, inappropriate for a visit to the Temple, is emblematic of her formerly sinful life centered on vanity & pleasure. Converted by this encounter Mary then turns to a life of piety. The jewellery slipping from her neck foreshadows her subsequent renunciation of worldly goods. The scene depicted is absent from the Bible & the Golden Legend but narrated in Pietro Aretino's book 'L'umanità di Cristo' (1535). This publication was widely read in Northern Italy & probably constitutes the literary source for the painting. ...

This painting by a Cologne artist, together with ' The Mass of Saint Hubert' was one of the inside shutters of an altarpiece from the Benedictine Abbey at Werden, near Cologne. The outside shutters, depicting various saints, are also in the National Galler ...

The painting is unusual, though by no means unique, as a Dutch painting of the later 17th century representing a dramatic religious theme. Such subjects had been treated by Rembrandt &, in the earlier years of the century, by the Dutch followers of Cara ...

Christ appearing in the clouds strikes his persecutor Saul blind. Saul (henceforth Paul) is the prominent figure who has fallen on the ground beside his horse. This is the moment of his conversion. New Testament (Acts 9: 1-9). This has been variously attri ...

The painting probably dates from shortly before Rottenhammer's move from Rome to Venice, about 1595/6, & is mentioned by his biographer, Carel van Mander (1604), who describes it as the first work to have brought fame to the painter. This meticulously e ...

The subject is more properly the Glorification of the Virgin, who is usually shown crowned by Christ & God the Father. Here the Virgin is crowned by angels (possibly as ' Regina angelorum'
- Queen of angels) & elements of the Assumption are mingled with those of the Glorification. The most evolved of Reni's treatments of the subject & generally dated about 1607.
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This was probably the central panel of an altarpiece, possibly from the church of San Giovanni de' Fieri near Pisa. It probably dates from the 1380s. Agnolo Gaddi, son of the painter Taddeo Gaddi, worked chiefly in Florence where the Coronation of the Virgin was an extremely popular subject for an altarpiece (see also ' The Coronation of the Virgin' by Jacopo di Cione & that by Lorenzo Monaco). The pink in Christ's robes & in the robes of the Virgin may have originally been richer & have faded with time. Many of the old retouchings have become discoloured. ...

The composition is based on the central panel of the ' Baroncelli Polyptych' signed by Giotto. Both have as their subject the coronation of the Virgin Mary as Queen of Heaven, & intercessor for mankind. The surface of Daddi's painting, however, is more decorative than Giotto's, with a harmonious arrangement of gold-patterned pinks, whites & greys, dramatically contrasting with the bold celestial blue of Christ's robe. He also made the Virgin's pose deliberately ambiguous, so that we are unsure whether she is enthroned or kneeling in a posture of humility. This is the upper part of a panel that once had figures of four music-making angels & Saint John the Baptist & a deacon saint (probably Saint Stephen) in the lower part, which survives at Christ Church, Oxford. It is possible that this was a single independent panel, or that it was once part of a polyptych, made for the high altar of a church. ...

The ' Coronation of the Virgin', the centre panel of the altarpiece, shows Mary being crowned Queen of Heaven by her son Jesus Christ, in the presence of saints & choirs of angels with musical instruments. The saints on the left wing include Benedict (in white) with a book inscribed with the words from his Rule, Matthew with a book inscribed with words from his Gospel (2: 1), Miniato, Stephen, & Francis. Among the saints on the right wing are Romuald (in white), Peter holding keys, John the Evangelist with a book inscribed with words from his Gospel (1: 1), Lawrence & Dominic. The altarpiece comes from the Camaldolese monastery (now destroyed) of San Benedetto fuori della Porta a Pinti, Florence. It is a smaller version of one painted in 1414 for the main church of the order in Florence, where Lorenzo Monaco was a monk. The vertical strips on either side of this central panel have been reconstructed in order to recreate the effect of a unified pictorial surface. ...