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Lamentation of Christ
Andrea Mantegna · Renaissance & Mannerism
- Artist
- Andrea Mantegna (c. 1431–1506)
- Date
- c. 1480
- Dimensions
- 68 x 81 cm
- Medium
- Tempera on canvas
- Location
- Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan, Italy
Mantegna's Lamentation shows the dead Christ lying on a marble slab, seen from his feet, in a startling foreshortened view. At the edge, the Virgin Mary, Saint John and Mary Magdalene weep over him.
A closer look
The radical viewpoint brings us right up against the body: we see the soles of the feet with their nail wounds, then the legs under a heavy sheet, the chest, and finally the head turned slightly towards us. Mantegna actually shortened the feet and enlarged the head to make the view more expressive than strict perspective would allow. The colours are muted, almost greyish, giving the scene a cold, sculptural gravity. The weeping faces squeezed into the corner contrast with the stillness of death. Few paintings make the reality of Christ's death so physical.
