Christ and the Adulteress (Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery)

Christ and the Adulteress (Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery)

Title

Christ and the Adulteress (Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery)

[Chrysler Museum of Art, revised 2015]

Painting on wood

Medium

Painting on wood

[Chrysler Museum of Art, revised 2015]

This is an oil on panel painting. The panel contains evidence of eighteen people, although, for some only the tops of their heads can be seen. The perspective is in close range, bringing the viewer into an intimate space. Christ is in the center wearing a red robe over a

This is an oil on panel painting. The panel contains evidence of eighteen people, although, for some only the tops of their heads can be seen. The perspective is in close range, bringing the viewer into an intimate space. Christ is in the center wearing a red robe over a bluish gray tunic. His left hand holds the wrist of the adulterous woman, his right points two fingers at her. She wears an orange dress, the bodice of which is slightly torn open revealing her breast. She wears a thin filmy scarf around her shoulder and over her head. Her eyes are cast downward. To Christ's right are two white bearded men, they seem to be in discussion with Christ. The one man in the foreground has a bag of rocks; he clutches one stone behind his back. Each man has a different facial expression as well as distinct features: there are no perfect generic faces, they are all very individual. The man in soldier's garb on Christ's left in the foreground looks directly at the viewer, as if suddenly he is aware of being observed.

[http://collection.chrysler.org/emuseum/copyright/7565?t:state:flow=442ca83a-10eb-4cb0-a3f7-1e2180b204b0] (accessed 14.04.2014)

Attributions
Lucas Cranach the Younger
Lucas Cranach the Younger and workshop

Attributions

Lucas Cranach the Younger

[Chrysler Museum of Art, revised 2015]

Lucas Cranach the Younger and workshop

'possibly with workshop participation'
[Friedländer, Rosenberg 1979, No. 364]

Production dates
1532 - 1537
after 1537

Production dates

1532 - 1537

[Chrysler Museum of Art, revised 2015]

after 1537

[Friedländer, Rosenberg 1979, No. 364]

Dimensions
Dimensions of support: 74.3 x 121.9 cm (29 1/4 x 48 in.)

Dimensions

  • Dimensions of support: 74.3 x 121.9 cm (29 1/4 x 48 in.)

  • Dimensions including frame: 96.5 x 144.8 x 8.9 cm (38 x 57 x 3 1/2 in.)

  • [Chrysler Museum of Art, revised 2015]

Signature / Dating

Artist's insignia at the upper right after inscription: winged serpent with elevated wings of a bat.

Signature / Dating

  • Artist's insignia at the upper right after inscription: winged serpent with elevated wings of a bat.

  • [Chrysler Museum of Art, revised 2015]

Inscriptions and Labels

On top: 'WER VNTER EVCH ON SVNDE IST DER WERFFE DEN ERSTEN STEIN AVF SIE . IOH . VIII …

Inscriptions and Labels

Inscriptions, Badges:

  • On top:

  • 'WER VNTER EVCH ON SVNDE IST DER WERFFE DEN ERSTEN STEIN AVF SIE . IOH . VIII .'

  • [cda 2015]

Owner
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia
Repository
Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Virginia
Location
Norfolk
CDA ID
US_ChrMA_71-484
FR (1978) Nr.
FR364
Persistent Link
https://lucascranach.org/en/US_ChrMA_71-484/

Provenance

  • Wesendonck auction, Cologne (Lempertz), Nov. 27, 1935, lot 24, on loan to Bonn, Provinzialmuseum (cat. 1927, nr. 50)
  • Wesendonck collection, Hamburg, Germany; Gsell collection, Vienna, Austria
  • Schonemon Galleries, NYC
  • Walter P. Chrysler, Jr.
  • Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr. to the Chrysler Museum, 1971.

[Chrysler Museum of Art, revised 2015]

Exhibitions

  • Bonn 1935
  • Birmingham, AL; Washington, D.C., Atlanta, GA; Columbus, OH; Dallas, TX; Columbus, GA; New Orleans, LA; West Palm Beach, FL; Columbia, SC; Chattanooga, TN. (Exhib. cat. no. p. 13), 1957-1958
  • Provincetown, MA, 1958 (Exhib. cat. no. 13).

Literature

Reference on page Catalogue Number Figure / Plate
Exhib. Cat. Gotha, Kassel 2015 196 under No. 54
EditorJulia Carrasco, Justus Lange, Stiftung Schloss Friedenstein, Gotha, Benjamin D. Spira, Timo Trümper
TitleBild und Botschaft. Cranach im Dienst von Hof und Reformation, [Gotha, Herzogliches Museum; Kassel, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Schloss Wilhelmshöhe]
Place of PublicationHeidelberg
Year of Publication2015
Andersson 1981 58, Fn. 43
AuthorChristiane D. Anderson
TitleReligiöse Bilder Cranachs im Dienste der Reformation
Publicationin L.W. Spitz, ed., Humanismus und Reformation als kulturelle Kräfte in der Deutschen Geschichte
Place of PublicationBerlin, New York
Year of Publication1981
Pages43-76
Friedländer, Rosenberg 1979 No. 364
AuthorMax J. Friedländer, Jakob Rosenberg
EditorG. Schwartz
TitleDie Gemälde von Lucas Cranach
Place of PublicationBasel, Boston, Stuttgart
Year of Publication1979
Exhib. Cat. Provincetown 1958 10, 53 No. 13 Fig p. 53
AuthorBertina S. Manning
TitleChrysler Art Museum of Provincetown Inaugural Exhibitiion [Provincetown, Massachusetts]
Place of PublicationProvincetown/Massachusetts
Year of Publication1958
Exhib. Cat. Birmingham, Al. 1957 13
Authorn. a.
TitleAn Exhibition of Dutch, Flemish, and German Paintings from the Collection of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr. [The Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL; George Washington University, Washington, D.C., among others]
Place of PublicationNew York
Year of Publication1957
Friedländer, Rosenberg 1932 83 292
AuthorMax J. Friedländer, Jakob Rosenberg
TitleDie Gemälde von Lucas Cranach
Place of PublicationBerlin
Year of Publication1932
Link http://digi.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/diglit/friedlaender1932

Research History / Discussion

Object label:

Lucas Cranach the Younger German, Wittenberg and Weimar (1515-1586) Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery, after 1537, Oil on panel Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr. 71.484

Lucas Cranach the Younger was trained by, and worked alongside, his famous father Cranach the Elder, who served as court painter to the Electors of Saxony and often used his art to promote the Protestant cause of his friend Martin Luther. At the Elder's death in 1553, Cranach the Younger inherited his busy workshop and carried his father's style into the late sixteenth century. With its broadly modeled figures and bright colors flatly applied, the schematic design of the painting here typifies the Cranach shop style - a style intended to convey narrative as simply and directly as possible. As told in John 8:2-11, the Pharisees, hoping to trap Jesus in an intellectual double bind, confronted him with an adulterous woman and demanded she be killed for her crime as dictated by the law of Moses. Jesus deflected their challenge by answering, "Let him who is without sin among you cast the first stone." (That text, in German, is inscribed along the painting's upper edge.) Filled with shame, the defeated Pharisees dispersed. Cranach depicts the story's climax: As the Pharisees clamor for an answer, Christ points compassionately at the adulteress and forgives her sin. Luther himself preached on the theme of Christ and the adulteress, reminding his listeners that any sinner, if repentant, could be forgiven in "the kingdom of Christ."

[http://collection.chrysler.org/emuseum/copyright/7565?t:state:flow=442ca83a-10eb-4cb0-a3f7-1e2180b204b0] (accessed 14.04.2014)

  • Christ and the Adulteress (Christ and the Woman Taken in Adultery), 1532 - 1537

Citing from the Cranach Digital Archive

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