Virgin with Grapes

Images of the Virgin and other mariological subjects constitute a considerable part of the oeuvre of Lucas Cranach and his workshop. The half-length depiction of the Virgin with the infant Christ has survived in a rich range of multiple variants. The Virgin with a Bunch of Grapes in the Wartburg Collection can be counted among these numerous representations. The young and very affectionate figure of Mary is shown in front of a dark curtain hemmed with gold and held up by two angels. The curtain occupies almost the entire background, leaving no room to set the scene in a surrounding landscape, instead the softly illuminated interaction between mother and child without any 'worldly content' takes the centre stage. The Virgin wears a dark robe with white puffed sleeves and a red cloak, with her right hand she gently embraces the infant Christ who stands on her lap. In her left hand she holds a bunch of grapes in front of her chest. A delicate veil falls over her long hair and covers her forehead. The infant is turned towards his mother, he has plucked a grape from the bunch and places it in his mother's mouth. This act alludes to Christ's sacrificial death to redeem mankind from sin and the eucharist. The exceptional intimacy of the scene is heightened by the fact that the protagonists look at each other, and the viewer is only a witness to the act .

The considerable changes, including the reduction of the background and concentration on the human relationship between mother and child, charged by the symbolism of the grapes, allow us to date the painting to the 1530s, when a number of similar representations were created.

[Wartburg-Stiftung, revised 2013]