The Virgin Mary at Prayer, Figure of the Church
At first glance difficult to place, this portrait was—surprisingly—painted by Albrecht Dürer († 1528) in an atypical tribute to his friend and mentor Giovanni Bellini († 1516). It was from this Venetian master that the German learned the full sensuality of form, the rendering of internal emotion, and, above all, the expressive power of color in its own right. With his unequaled genius for accuracy, Dürer here carries these Italian methods to new heights. Its message can be found precisely in the interplay of color values and their contrasts—striking yet never clashing.

This is the masterpiece of the great man of prayer that was Albrecht Dürer. The hands joined in prayer are wonderful in the physical expression of a spiritual attitude. These eyes, opening onto the inmost depths of the soul, seem fixed upon the eyes of a face situated above and beyond all else. The subtlety of the smile—the artistic rival of Mona Lisa—is simply beatific, lighting up the features with the reflected glow of love burning within Mary’s heart. The entire being of this young woman chastely reverberates in response to the grace with which she has been blessed.

Dürer was initially in favor of Luther’s calls for a profound reform of the Church. But he wished for reform without excess, hatred, or rifts. When the breaking point finally came, he distanced himself from the Protestants and, following in the humanist footsteps of Erasmus, turned back toward the Church of Rome. This work was painted in 1518 while Dürer was an active participant in the Diet of Augsburg, the final attempt to reach accomodation between Protestant and Catholic. To the very end, he clung to the hope that Christian love might prevail and lead to reconciliation. This image of Mary is the fruit of that hope. In the intensity of her spiritual presence and the symbolism of the shimmering spectrum of colors, Mary becomes here a figure of the Church, one and holy, gathering to herself all the diversity of Christian traditions and bearing them heavenward in the prayer of love that unites it to God.

Pierre-Marie Dumont

Praying Virgin (1518), Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528), Gemäldegalerie, Berlin, Germany. © BPK, Berlin, dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Jörg P. Anders.
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Murillo painted the Holy Family with a Little Bird in the naturalistic style made fashionable in Seville by Zurbarán and Velázquez. The painting's name comes from the little bird Jesus is showing the dog. The complete absence of divine or celestial elements turns the painting into a family scene, as if the painter had opened the doors of his own house to show us the little boy playing, accompanied by his father and the mother who has taken a rest from her spinning to eat an apple. The figures are elegant although they are still quite realistic. The main figure is Jesus, lit by a powerful beam of light that comes from the left provoking light and shade contrasts and leaving the background in complete darkness. The figures are silhouetted against this background and despite the darkness Joseph's bench can be made out next to him. The contrasts have been toned down so they cannot be regarded as strictly tenebrist. Murillo's excellent drawing skills are clearly apparent in his early works, where small details play important roles such as Mary's workbasket, the folds in the cloths, the figures' limbs and the little dog's gesture. Murillo's interest in drawing led him to set up an Academy of Painting in 1660 with Francisco de Herrera the Younger. The colouring of this painting is typical of his early period which followed the naturalistic style. Joseph is portrayed as one of the main figures in the scene, along with Jesus, and this was the result of theological debate over the role Joseph had played Jesus' life. Initially it was thought that he had played no part in Jesus' education (in fact in Bosch's triptych of the Adoration of the Magi he is relegated to a side panel). However, over time Joseph's role was considered more and more important and as a result in this painting he is represented as the ideal father, with an intelligent and patient face, and even consigns Mary to the background to some extent. In this Holy Family certain features of Raphael's painting are visible.

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