Peter Bruegel the Elder, Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium,
Brussels
Luke describes the event. “And it came to pass in those days
that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be
registered… Joseph went to Bethlehem to be registered with Mary, who was with
child.” For Bruegel, the event is contemporary, taking place in his native
Belgium in the harshest of winters. Mary and Joseph are just two more poor
people trudging through the freezing air to queue for this ruthlessly imposed
bureaucracy. The only thing that distinguishes them in the general misery and
chaos is the proverbial donkey.
2 | The Procession of the
Magi
Benozo Gozzoli, Medici Riccardi palace,
Florence
Not three kings, so much as 33: a whole cavalcade of the great
and good (or the rich and powerful) wends its way down a steep valley on the way
to Bethlehem. Gozzoli’s fresco, with its deer, hounds and horses, its hunting
and social conversation, could almost have been painted from life; and sure
enough these Magi include a throng of Medici godfathers and their hangers-on.
(The artist himself is among the portraits.) The image commemorates real events
– the annual Epiphany procession in 15th-century Florence – as it tries to make
biblical events real for contemporary viewers. It’s the high point of the Magi
chapel in Florence.
3 | The Dream of St
Joseph
Philippe de Champaigne, National Gallery,
London
Photograph:
National Gallery, London
In the Gospel of Matthew, Mary is pledged in marriage to Joseph
when he discovers she is pregnant. In consternation, he decides to continue with
the marriage but with future divorce in mind. But God sends an angel to Joseph
in a dream to explain the divine conception and ask him to name the baby Jesus.
The French painter Champaigne is one of very few artists to depict Joseph’s
story, imagining his dilemma and this angelic intervention. And just like a
figure in a dream, the angel speaks without words, explaining the mystery
entirely in sign language.
The mysterious Giorgione left very few works at his premature
death, but this one is a masterpiece of contemplation. The elderly Joseph is
deep in prayer, Mary holds a pose of silent worship before the Christ child,
whose hazy face appears so inward-looking. The shepherds, in their ragged
clothes, are speechless and spellbound, but full of love for the baby. They are
the first to arrive, the first to understand what they are seeing, before the
rest of the crowd arrives. The scene is very close and intimate, against the
distant Venetian landscape. Not a sheep in sight. By their humility shall you
know the shepherds.
5 | Mary and Joseph on the Way to
Bethlehem (Portinari Altarpiece)
Hugo van der Goes, Uffizi Gallery,
Florence
Detail from Portinari
Altarpiece.Photograph: Galleria degli
Uffizi, Florence, Italy
Mary and Joseph are on their way through a rocky landscape. She
has climbed down from the donkey, perhaps afraid of riding down such a perilous,
ankle-breaking slope. Joseph, grizzled and weary, is helping her along with all
his loving kindness, his actions (rather than her physical appearance)
suggesting just how pregnant she is. Jesus’s earthly father is generally
portrayed as ineffectual but not in this vision, a detail from the famous
Portinari Altarpiece in Florence. He is doing everything he can, as husband and
prospective new father, to protect his little family from hardship and danger.
6 | The
Nativity
Federico Barrocci, Prado museum, Madrid
Of all the many thousands of nativity scenes in western art,
this one is among the most tenderly maternal. Mary kneels humbly before her God,
but she is equally full of love for her newborn baby. Mother and child gaze into
each other’s eyes and the whole composition emphasises their mutual bond. The
art of Barrocci, until recently one of the most overlooked of Italian masters,
was especially popular with women in his lifetime and it is not hard to see why
from this nativity, in which the radiant child illuminates the exquisitely
loving face of Mary.
7 | Adoration of the
Magi
Botticelli, Uffizi Gallery, Florence
More Medici - including Lorenzo and Giuliano, Botticelli’s
patrons – appear in varying states of worship before the newborn Christ. The
scene is anything but hallowed and hushed. The Medici are not all intent on the
baby, whose miraculous birth has taken place in a derelict outhouse of yawning
rafters on the brink of collapse. But Botticelli raises the holy family above
these queuing Italians and finds a way to bring the ancient past into the
present. He shifts the tense by including himself, on the extreme right, fixing
you with a pressuring gaze – how deep is your respect, your love?
8 | Annunciation to the
Shepherds
Taddeo Gaddi, church of Santa Croce,
Florence
Luke reports
that the shepherds were tending their flocks outside Bethlehem when an angel
suddenly appeared, announcing that the saviour has just been born in the town.
Medieval painter Taddeo Gaddi imagines the scene taking place on a steep hill in
the middle of the night. only one of the shepherds is awake so far, the other
hunched like a rock behind him. Sheep and dogs are beginning to stir too, as the
angel speaks from above – a shepherd and his flock waking up to the astonishing
news.
9 | The
Annunciation
Fra Angelico, Convent of San Marco,
Florence
Photograph: Convento di San Marco, Florence
Here is the news, delivered by an angel. The Virgin Mary is
pregnant. The son of God is on his way. In this exquisite painting, by a
Florentine monk, the split-second of the telling appears to be the very moment
of conception itself. Mary listens in astonishment, hands crossed over her body
as if receiving a blessing, but also as if protecting the new life there. Her
face is a graceful portrait of awe, bewilderment and emotion: the sudden
revelation made visible.
10 | Rest on the
Flight to Egypt
Orazio Gentileschi, Birmingham Art
Gallery
Rest on the Flight To
EgyptPhotograph: PR
What a scene: bisected by a rough brick wall,
dominated by the donkey’s head popping above it, Gentileschi’s Rest is
a staggeringly strange composition. Joseph is flat out with exhaustion, his
snoring head lolling backwards. The Virgin’s feet are dirty and she is too tired
to cradle the hungry baby, who looks furtively in our direction. The holy family
are fugitives from murderous Herod and his massacre of the innocents. The
nativity scene of a billion Christmas cards is all
over now.
