“Representing the event of the birth of Jesus is equivalent to announcing the mystery of the Incarnation of the Son of God with simplicity and joy”. As Pope Francis recalls, the birth of Jesus inspired generations of artists who over the centuries have evangelized through beauty. To experience Advent and Christmas, Vatican News offers each week a masterpiece from the pontifical collections accompanied by the words of the Popes
Paolo Ondarza – Vatican City
The Nativity that we propose to you in the fourth week of Advent is taken from a section of the predella of an altarpiece around 1450 by Benozzo Gozzoli for the Church of San Fortunato in Montefalco in Umbria. The painter, favorite pupil of Beato Angelico, with whom he completed his training after starting out as an apprentice goldsmith, dedicated the panel to the Virgin Mary, known by the name of “Madonna della Cintola”, donated to Pius IX in 1848 and today preserved in the Vatican Art Gallery.
Benozzo di Lese, known as Benozzo Gozzoli, (Florence 1420 – Pistoia 1497) Madonna della Cintola, 1450-52, Tempera on wood, 133 x 164 cm, Inv. 40262, Vatican Pinacoteca ©Vatican Museums
The waist
In the upper part of the painting, the Mother of Jesus surrounded by angels, offers, as proof of her ascent into heaven, the belt to Saint Thomas who, having not witnessed the death, burial and assumption of Mary, did not want to believe what the others told him about what had happened.
Benozzo di Lese, known as Benozzo Gozzoli, (Florence 1420 – Pistoia 1497) Madonna della Cintola, (detail), 1450-52, Tempera on wood, 133 x 164 cm, Inv. 40262, Vatican Pinacoteca ©Vatican Museums
The life of Mary
At the base of the altarpiece, in the rectangular panel painted with several panels, called the predella, Benozzo expresses his great qualities as a decorator and illustrates episodes from the life of the Virgin: the birth, the wedding, the annunciation, the nativity of Christ, the circumcision of Jesus and the death of Mary.
The Nativity
The Nativity scene in the Bethlehem cave – hut is intimate and intimate. The darkness is illuminated by the light emanating from the Child on whose sides are the Virgin and Saint Joseph, adoring. There is no shortage of figures of the ox and the donkey, taken from the Apocryphal Gospels. On the sides of the composition are depicted some shepherds who arrived after the nocturnal announcement of the angel, painted in the background at the top left.
Jesus is born, the true light that illuminates every man
“It was an angel who announced the birth of Jesus, and he did it to humble shepherds. And it was a star that showed the Magi the way to reach Bethlehem (see Mt 2,1.9-10). The angel is a messenger of God. The star reminds us that God created the light (Gen 1.3) and that that Child will be “the light of the world”, as He himself will define himself (see John 8.12.46), the “light true […] which gives light to every man” (Jn 1:9), which “shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it””
(Pope Francis – General Audience of 22 December 2021)
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