Hi everyone and welcome back to Exploring Art with Alessandro!
Today I am here with a short post because I want to wish a Merry Christmas with 7 Christmas paintings really different from each other, but that they represent this important moment of the year.
Giotto 7 Christmas paintings
Traditionally, Christmas is the day when Jesus was born. And Giotto depicted his Medieval idea of Nativity with the virgin Mary and Jesus under a shelter surrounded by praying angels and shepherds. Joseph is outside really tired because of the long journey.
Caravaggio
Another important religious episode is the Adoration of the Shepherds by the master Caravaggio. We can see the skills of this great painter depicting a really realistic scene. Mary is naturally exhausted after the childbirth and she is hugging Jesus without considering the people around them. Caravaggio used perfectly the light to intensify the intimate moment.
Monet 7 Christmas paintings
Christmas is snow right? And in Snow at Argenteuil, Claude Monet depicted a beautiful landscape where the snow is protagonist. We can identify just few people and some buildings in background. However, we can really feel the Winter atmosphere.
Botticelli
Another Nativity scene, but this one from Botticelli and I am sure you wouldn’t expect anything like that from him right? It’s a weird scene, not by chance it’s called The Mystical Nativity. The virgin Mary and Jesus bigger than the other figures, angels coming dancing from a hole in the sky and demons that are hiding probably scared by Jesus’ birth.
Gentile da Fabriano
In this Adoration of the Magi by Gentile da Fabriano we make a step back in a full Medieval scene. Full also because of the crowd present to celebrate Jesus’ birth. The engraved gold leaves make the scene really bright.
Guido Reni 7 Christmas paintings
Another Adoration of the Shepherds, this time by Guido Reni. A typical Baroque scene like inside a theater. Here Jesus is literally the light that create beautiful chiaroscuro effects on the characters.
Hendrick Avercamp
And then a joyful moment with this Winter scene in a Dutch village painted by Hendrick Avercamp between 1608 and 1609. It’s called A Winter Scene with Skaters near a Castle and the picture is part of the Flemish tradition of painting “the harmony of human activity and the cycle of nature”.
