The Story
Girolamo da Carpi painted this intimate work for the Este family of Ferrara, Italy; it adorned the oratory chapel of their palace. The painting shows Saint Luke drawing the Virgin Mary and the infant Jesus while Joseph watches from a doorway. The infant appears agitated, as if he possesses foreknowledge of his death: He is reacting to the spear-like yarn winder, an attribute of the Three Fates from Greek mythology and a symbol of death in Christian contexts as well. The painting’s distinguished history extends beyond the Estes.
It later came into the possession of two Roman cardinals, two Roman princes, the English Duke of Westminster, Baron Alfred de Rothschild, and the Earl of Carnavon, who famously financed the excavation of King Tutankhamen’s tomb.
Executed in Oil on panel, measuring 47 × 34 cm (18 9/16 × 13 7/16 in.); Framed: 69.6 × 57.2 × 5.8 cm (27 3/8 × 22 1/2 × 2 1/4 in.), the surface rewards close looking. Girolamo da Carpi builds the composition through layered glazes and a tightly controlled palette, letting cool shadows recede so that the warm, lit passages step forward. The brushwork shifts from the precise to the almost dissolved — a hallmark of mature Renaissance practice.
“A silence so complete it becomes its own witness.”
