Collection Publications: Reflections of the Passion (1997-587)

Many Venetian Renaissance painters portrayed the Virgin Mary adoring the reclining or sleeping Christ child. Since sleep resembles death, this was a means of alluding to his future sacrifice. The stone parapet evokes Christ's tomb as well as the altar where his sacrifice is reenacted. The Virgin, who looks down at the child as in the Pieta [y1962-79], calls to mind images of her lamentation over the dead Christ.