The Baptism of Christ

c. 1535/1540

Paris Bordone

Artist, Venetian, 1500 - 1571

Bright light from the upper left illuminates two muscular men and a winged angel against a dim landscape in this square painting. They all have pale skin, and the two men have dark brown hair and beards. One man, Jesus, stands ankle-deep in a rippling dark blue stream in the center of the composition facing us with downcast eyes. He is nude except for a white cloth that drapes over one shoulder and is tied around his hips. The other end of the cloth drops into the water. Jesus’s hands are pressed together in prayer at chest-height closer to his right shoulder, to our left. He leans his torso in the other direction and looks down at the water. The second man stands on the riverbank to our right. His body faces our left but his left shoulder, closer to us, dips down so his broad back is angled toward us. His lower body is wrapped in a cobalt-blue garment bordered with what looks like sheepskin. His near hand swings back to clutch the trunk of a tree growing immediately behind him. In his other hand, he holds up a pewter-grey dish that dribbles water onto Jesus’s head. On the left riverbank, the copper-haired angel looks on, facing our right in profile but the body faces us. The angel wears a sleeveless, pumpkin-orange robe with a shimmering salmon-pink mantle draped over the right shoulder, to our left. Petal-pink and dark grey wings extend from the shoulders, and the lower legs and feet are bare. The shadowy landscape has a dark green field stretching back to jagged, sapphire-blue mountains along the horizon, which comes four-fifths of the way up this composition. Pale blue clouds skim across the vivid blue sky, where three chubby, winged babies float. One holds a triangle and a rod with which to strike it, and another might hold a rectangular musical instrument. Blue clouds split nearby to show a sliver of golden yellow light, and possibly more angels.

Media Options

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On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 23

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on canvas

  • Credit Line

    Widener Collection

  • Dimensions

    overall: 129.5 x 132 cm (51 x 51 15/16 in.)
    framed: 177 x 178.8 x 10.2 cm (69 11/16 x 70 3/8 x 4 in.)

  • Accession

    1942.9.5

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Ambrogio Doria, Rome. William Earle, Liverpool; (his sale, Winstanley, Liverpool, 17 April 1839, no. 112). Charles Meigh, Grove House, Shelton, Stafford, England, by 1845; (his sale, Christie, Manson & Woods, London, 9 June 1855, no. 69); purchased by Bates. John Heugh, London, by 1877; (his sale, Christie, Manson & Woods, London, 11 May 1878, no. 274); purchased by (Thomas Agnew & Sons, London); by whom sold to H. Higgins; presumably by inheritance to Mrs. Higgins, Thing Hill, Hereford, England; (Higgins sale, Christie, Manson & Woods, London, 22 April 1899, no. 137); purchased by (Colnaghi, London and New York). (Eugène Fischhof); sold 1899 to Peter A. B. Widener, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania; inheritance from the Estate of Peter A. B. Widener by gift through power of appointment of Joseph E. Widener, Elkins Park; gift 1942 to NGA.[1]
[1] Provenance according to Widener records in NGA curatorial files.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1877

  • Exhibition of the Works of the Old Masters, Royal Academy, London, 1877, no. 112.

Bibliography

1916

  • Berenson, Bernard, and William Roberts. Pictures in the Collection of P.A.B. Widener at Lynnewood Hall, Elkins Park, Pennsylvania: Early Italian and Spanish Schools. Philadelphia, 1916: unpaginated, repro., as The Baptism of Our Lord.

1923

  • Paintings in the Collection of Joseph Widener at Lynnewood Hall. Intro. by Wilhelm R. Valentiner. Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, 1923: unpaginated, repro., as The Baptism of Our Lord.

1931

  • Paintings in the Collection of Joseph Widener at Lynnewood Hall. Intro. by Wilhelm R. Valentiner. Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, 1931: 42, repro., as The Baptism of Our Lord.

1942

  • Works of Art from the Widener Collection. Foreword by David Finley and John Walker. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 5.

1948

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Widener Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1948 (reprinted 1959): 22, repro.

1963

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. New York, 1963 (reprinted 1964 in French, German, and Spanish): 308, repro.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 16.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 9, repro.

1972

  • Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass., 1972: 32, 646.

1975

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 36, repro.

1979

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. 2 vols. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1979: 1:77-78; 2:pl. 50.

1984

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 219, no. 270, color repro.

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 54, repro.

1998

  • Denny, Don. "Baptism." In Encyclopedia of Comparative Iconography: Themes Depicted in Works of Art. Edited by Helene E. Roberts. 2 vols. Chicago, 1998: 2:107.

2002

  • Quodbach, Esmée. "The Last of the American Versailles: The Widener Collection at Lynnewood Hall." Simiolus 29, no. 1/2 (2002): 94.

2004

  • Hand, John Oliver. National Gallery of Art: Master Paintings from the Collection. Washington and New York, 2004: 83, no. 60, color repro.

Wikidata ID

Q20176089

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