''The Madonna of the Basket'' or the ''Madonna della Cesta'' is a painting by

Peter Paul Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens (; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat from the Duchy of Brabant in the Southern Netherlands (modern-day Belgium). He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque tradi ...

, dated to around 1615. It is now held in the

Galleria Palatina The Palazzo Pitti (), in English sometimes called the Pitti Palace, is a vast, mainly Renaissance, palace in Florence, Italy. It is situated on the south side of the River Arno, a short distance from the Ponte Vecchio. The core of the presen ...

of the

Palazzo Pitti The Palazzo Pitti (), in English sometimes called the Pitti Palace, is a vast, mainly Renaissance, palace in Florence, Italy. It is situated on the south side of the River Arno, a short distance from the Ponte Vecchio. The core of the present ...

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...

. Between 1799 and 1815 it was confiscated by the French and assigned to the Dijon Museum of Fine Arts.

History

The oldest mentions of the work are recorded to the

Villa del Poggio Imperiale Villa del Poggio Imperiale (English: Villa of the Imperial Hill) is a predominantly neoclassical former grand ducal villa in Arcetri, just to the south of Florence in Tuscany, Central Italy. Beginning as a villa of the Baroncelli of Florence, ...

in 1654–1655, then from 1697, at the Palazzo Pitti in th
"Parrot Room."
The work was registered in various other rooms until, in 1799, French inspectors sent the work to Paris, where it was stored at the Dijon Museum of Fine Arts. The painting remained there until the end of 1815 and was returned to Florence the following year. A copy of the work was found in a private collection in Vienna, with the signature of "L. Burchard" and of greater quality than the Florentine version. Another, more modest, copy can be seen in the Galleria di Palazzo Spinola in Genova, which is attributed to Jacob Jordaens.

Description and style

The basket that gives the work its traditional name is, in reality, the wicker cradle in which the baby Jesus rests, watched over by Mary and Joseph. He tenderly caresses the face of

John the Baptist John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...

, recognizable by the fur coat of a desert hermit. Behind him stands his mother, Saint Elizabeth. Joseph's mature, but not old, age suggests he was made to seem more like a saint. Inspired by Italian works, the work is marked by the influence of

Parmigianino Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola (11 January 150324 August 1540), also known as Francesco Mazzola or, more commonly, as Parmigianino (, , ; "the little one from Parma"), was an Italian Mannerist painter and printmaker active in Florence, Rome, B ...

, in the face of Mary. The fluid disposition of the people, the mastery of color and effects of brushstrokes, and the characterization of the people (like the resplendent hair, the opacity of Joseph's beard, and the material effect in the carpet under the baby Jesus) make this a small masterpiece that exemplifies the best work of Rubens. It is one of the better compositions on this religious subject realized around 1615, along with the painting at the

Wallace Collection The Wallace Collection is a museum in London occupying Hertford House in Manchester Square, the former townhouse of the Seymour family, Marquesses of Hertford. It is named after Sir Richard Wallace, who built the extensive collection, along ...

in London, which is dated to c. 1614.

Bibliography

* Marco Chiarini, ''Galleria palatina e Appartamenti Reali'', Sillabe, Livorno 1998.

External links

Official catalog record
{{Rubens Paintings by Peter Paul Rubens 1615 paintings Paintings in the collection of the Galleria Palatina Paintings of the Madonna and Child Paintings depicting John the Baptist Paintings of Elizabeth (biblical figure)