the presentation of jesus in the temple painting

Guercino, The Presentation of Jesus in the Temple

Forty days after his birth, Mary and Joseph brought the infant Christ to the Temple in Jerusalem. According to Jewish custom, all first-born male children were to be taken to the Temple to be presented to God in a ceremony that involved the sacrifice of two doves or pigeons, visible here at the foot of the altar. The elderly seated figure is the high priest Simeon. The Gospel of Luke says that the Holy Ghost had told Simeon he would not die until he had seen the Messiah. Guercino portrays the moments preceding the story’s climax, as the aged Simeon is about to hold Christ and, in recognising him, fulfil his destiny.

This work was painted for Bartolomeo Fabri, one of Guercino’s early patrons, who lived in the artist’s native Cento. It was returned to Guercino in settlement of a debt, and he kept it by his bedside until he was eventually persuaded to sell it in 1660.

Mary and Joseph brought the infant Christ, forty days after his birth, to be presented in the Temple in Jerusalem. According to Jewish custom, all first-born male children were to be taken to the Temple to be presented to God in a ceremony that involved the sacrifice of two doves or pigeons, which can be seen here at the foot of the altar.

The elderly seated figure on the right is the high priest Simeon. The Gospel of Luke says the Holy Ghost had told Simeon that he would not die until he had seen the Messiah. With the aged priest about to receive the infant Christ in his arms, Guercino captures the moments preceding this story’s climax. In the seconds that follow, Simeon recognises Christ and realises that his destiny has been fulfilled. Embracing death, he utters, ‘Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word. For mine eyes have seen thy salvation’ (Luke 2: 29.)

Guercino painted this work in 1623, shortly after returning to his native Cento from a two-year stay in Rome. During his time there he had seen the work of Domenichino, whose influence is apparent in the clearly defined planes and recession of space in this picture, as well as in the evenly dispersed light and vibrant use of colour. Architecture features more prominently here than in Guercino’s pre-Roman works, which are often crowded with figures tightly cropped by the picture frame (such as, for example, in The Incredulity of Saint Thomas ). Guercino has used the architecture to carefully construct the space, and has paid attention to the decorative elements, including the stone steps and sculpted bas-relief on the altar.

Despite some evolution, aspects of Guercino’s early style remain. The naturalistic, aged figure of Saint Joseph in the centre resembles Elijah from Guercino’s 1620 painting Elijah fed by Ravens . With his aged, weathered face, Joseph presents a contrast to the young Virgin and infant Christ. His slightly dishevelled appearance and simple clothing are set against the immaculately dressed high priest. Simeon’s embroidered cope is remarkably similar to that of Saint Gregory in Guercino’s Saint Gregory the Great with Saints Ignatius Loyola and Francis Xavier.

This painting is unusually large for a work on copper. Because copper was an expensive material, these pictures were typically smaller; like, for example, Guercino’s The Dead Christ Mourned by Two Angels . The artist makes the most of the copper’s smooth and luminous surface, painting with great delicacy (note the ducks in the basket of the candlestick on the altar) but also attaining monumentality in the figures. Guercino used an opaque orange ground for this work which is visible in parts of the image, particularly the architecture in the upper right section of the painting.

The picture was painted for Bartolomeo Fabri, one of Guercino’s early patrons who lived in the artist’s native Cento. (Fabri had also commissioned The Incredulity of Saint Thomas from Guercino two years earlier). The painting was later returned to the artist in settlement of a debt. According to his biographer, Carlo Cesare Malvasia, Guercino kept the painting by his bed and refused offers from numerous distinguished collectors looking to buy it, including Cardinal Antonio Barberini and Cardinal Prince Leopoldo de’ Medici. Guercino eventually sold it in 1660 to Raphael Dufresne, who offered a substantial sum and presented the artist with an inscribed copy of Leonardo da Vinci’s Trattato della pittura (Treatise on Painting).

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More paintings by Guercino

Presentation of Jesus in the Temple, 1631 by Rembrandt

In Presentation of Jesus in the Temple , Rembrandt has taken the moment when the aged Simeon takes the infant Jesus in his armswhile the Virgin is seated nearby almost completely surrounded by priests and elders. The setting is dramatic in the extreme. The architecture of the temple is on a grandiose scale: vaguely Gothic, half ruined, half finished, it gives an air of total mystery to the whole scene, while Simeon, who has been promised by the Lord that he should not see Death before he had seen the Lord's Christ, recites the Nunc Dimittis.

Rembrandt took his religious subjects very seriously, and his knowledge of the Bible, including the Apocrypha, was exceptional in the sense that he frequently depicted unusual stories. He also has an amazing concern for accuracy to the original text - only rarely does he use artistic licence. It is almost always possible to pin-point the precise source of the subject-in the case of the Presentation Luke ii, 25-35.

Rebrandt's religious pictures from this early period are relatively numerous. During his four decades career, Rembrandt executed 3 paintings, 3 etchings, and several drawings on the theme of Presentation of Jesus in the Temple , and these constitutes his largest body of work on a single biblical subject

The Storm on the Sea of Galilee

The Night Watch

The Return of the Prodigal Son

Jacob Blessing the Children of Joseph

The Anatomy Lesson of Dr Nicolaes Tulp

The Jewish Bride

Syndics of the Drapers Guild

Jan Six, 1654

Hundred Guilder Print, 1649

Bathsheba at her Bath

Belshazzars Feast

Aristotle with a Bust of Homer

The Blinding of Samson

The Conspiracy of Claudius Civilis

Self Portrait, 1669

The Polish Rider

Self Portrait, 1658

A Woman Bathing in a Stream

Self Portrait, Age 34

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The Presentation in the Temple

Rembrandt c. 1654, the cleveland museum of art cleveland, united states.

Rembrandt often illustrated the intimate meaning of biblical events. Here Simeon, to whom "it was revealed ... by the Holy Ghost, that he should not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ," holds up the infant Jesus toward the High Priest, a frail figure who allows the prayer book to slip from his grasp. At the left, the Virgin Mary and Joseph humbly kneel in the shadows, while a priest with an enormous crozier towers over all. To Rembrandt , light symbolized divinity and spirituality. By using an unsystematic network of fine crosshatching in the background and by varying the density of groups of parallel lines on the figures, he created an evocative atmosphere where forms emerge from shimmering half-lights. Rembrandt's ability to create a rich pictorial effect with linear means can only be fully appreciated in superb impressions such as this one, where the drypoint accents are fresh and strong and the nuances of the shading are perfectly realized.

• Title: The Presentation in the Temple
• Creator: Rembrandt van Rijn (Dutch, 1606-1669)
• Date Created: c. 1654
• Physical Dimensions: Overall: 21 x 16.3 cm (8 1/4 x 6 7/16 in.)
• Type: Print
• Rights: CC0
• External Link: https://clevelandart.org/art/1999.3
• Medium: etching , drypoint and engraving
• Department: Prints
• Culture: Netherlands, 17th century
• Credit Line: Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund
• Collection: PR - Etching
• Accession Number: 1999.3

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Story of a painting – Rembrandt’s “Presentation in the Temple”

The subject is the biblical story of Simeon. Jesus was still an infant when Joseph and Mary took him to the temple to be presented to God. There they were approached by Simeon, a devout old man who recognised the child as the Saviour and praised him to God.

The most famous of these works was in 1631 when he was about 25 and still living in Leiden. Later that year he moved to Amsterdam. This painting is the high point of Rembrandt’s Leiden years: it represents the sum total of his artistic abilities at that

Most of his paintings are in very dark tones out of which his figures seem to appear to the foreground. Rembrandt was the master of dark and light and most of his pictures are made in this style of struggle between dark and light, night and day, sorrow and joy.

The key to the picture is how carefully and delicate the figures are painted, even those in the darkest part of the painting. The beautiful contrast, between the light on the central group and the soft dimness of the remoter parts of the cathedral, illustrates a style of work for which Rembrandt was very famous.

Our eyes are drawn to the very emotional Simeon, eyes aglow. As with the priest, his figures are often elongated in this period. The pictures is framed by the two figures behind Mary and Joseph in dark contrasting with Mary’s blue and Simeon’s shimmering robe.

Rembrandt adhered fairly closely to the biblical text. Simeon, with the infant Jesus in his arms, praises God with upturned face. To his left kneels the surprised Mary. Joseph holds the two doves he has brought along to sacrifice. Simeon praises Jesus as ‘a light to lighten the Gentiles’, which is why Rembrandt portrayed the Christ Child as a veritable source of light

However, the picture is not realistic of the temple. He depicts a Gothic Cathedral with the beggars looking at the Christ-child. They were beggars of Amsterdam, and the men seated in the wooden settle at the right were like the respectable Dutch burghers of his acquaintance. His style featured large cavernous spaces.

The following is a description of this image – "http://grandearte.net/rembrandt/presentation-temple"

"In the picture we find ourselves, as it were, among the worshippers in the temple, looking at the group on the pavement in front of us—Mary and Joseph and Simeon, kneeling before a priest, with two or three onlookers. It is a Gothic cathedral, in whose dim recesses many people move hither and thither. At the right is a long flight of steps leading to a throne, which is overshadowed by a huge canopy. At the top of the steps we see the high priest seated with hands outstretched, receiving the people who throng up the stairway. It was towards this stairway that Mary and Joseph were making their way, when the aged Simeon first saw them, and recognized in the child they carried the one he had long expected. Taking the babe from his mother’s arms, he kneels on the marble-tiled pavement and raises his face to heaven in thanksgiving. His embroidered cymar, or robe, falls about him in rich folds as he clasps his arms about the tiny swaddled figure.

"Mary has dropped on her knees beside him, listening to his words with happy wonder. Joseph, just beyond, looks on with an expression of inquiry. He carries two turtle doves as the thank offering required of the mother by the religious law. His unkempt appearance and bare feet contrast with the neat dress of Mary. The tall priest standing before them extends his hands towards the group in a gesture of benediction. A broad ray of light gleams on his strange headdress, lights up his outstretched hand, and falls with dazzling brilliancy upon the soft round face of the babe, the smiling mother, and the venerable Simeon with flowing white hair and beard.

"There are but few people to pay any heed to the strange incident. Two or three of those who climb the stairway turn about and stare curiously at the group below. There are three others still more interested. One man behind puts his turbaned head over Simeon’s shoulders, peering inquisitively at the child, as if trying to see what the old man finds so remarkable in him. Beyond, two old beggars approach with a sort of good-natured interest. They are quaintly dressed, one of them wearing a very tall cap. Such humble folk as these alone seem to have time to notice others’ affairs.”

2 thoughts on “Story of a painting – Rembrandt’s “Presentation in the Temple””

What a truly amazing painting this is. The contrast between dark and light is truly beautiful. It is unusual for another apart from the father to be holding the child. A beautiful scene of amazing contrasts.

I just happened to look this painting up because it was mentioned in my Magnificat. And I found your website. Thank you so much I really enjoyed reading about the painting.

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Salviati (Giuseppe Porta, 1520-75) The Presentation of Jesus in the Temple

Church of Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, Venice, Italy

Thou shalt set apart all that openeth the womb for the Lord, and all that is first brought forth of thy cattle: whatsoever thou shalt have of the male sex, thou shalt consecrate to the Lord. The firstborn of an ass thou shalt change for a sheep: and if thou do not redeem it, thou shalt kill it. And every firstborn of men thou shalt redeem with a price.

In the painting the high priest has received the baby for the Lord, and the young woman kneeling before him offers two doves as the "price" by which the child is "redeemed." The artist reminds the viewer of the typological relation between this ransom and Christ's redemptive sacrifice on the Cross by having the angel hover above with a crown of thorns and what looks to be the sponge-bearer's rod from Crucifixion images. In the York play of the Purification Joseph expresses this typology when he tells Mary not to worry that they cannot afford to get a lamb to offer because the baby "is the lamb of God, I say, that all our sins shall take away" ( Davidson , 120). Mary herself is pictured with her spouse in the shadows on the left, so one might well ask who the young woman with the doves could be. No such woman stands in for the parents in Luke nor in any of the apocrypha, yet one is often pictured in Presentations standing by with the two doves in a basket. In those images she is probably just one of the virgins who had served with Mary in the Temple, but here the artist is most likely upgrading her to a figure of the "holy virgin Church" whose "hidden womb" Christ was to open "for the begetting of nations" ( Catena , III, i, 81). The curve of the young woman's body leads the eye down along the Holy Cross to another way of picturing the Church, the six saints in the lower register. On the left are St. Paul with the sword that is his attribute and St. Peter, with his short, square beard and episcopal crozier. Between them St. Helena holds onto the Cross. On the right, St. Bernardino holds the glowing "IHS" emblem that is his attribute. The other two on the right are hard to identify, although one might guess that the man with the book is Luke, whose gospel narrates the Presentation event. Intent on the typological reading of the event, the artist has even omitted Simeon, whose witness is strongly emphasized in the liturgy and the plays. 1 He does include the widow Anna, the other witness mentioned in Luke who "spoke of him [the child Jesus] to all that looked for the redemption of Israel." In the painting she stands behind the High Priest in her widow's weeds. View this image in full resolution . Read more about images of the Presentation in the Temple and the Circumcision . Read more about images of St. Paul . Read more about images of St. Helena . Read more about images of St. Peter . Read more about images of St. Bernardino . Read more about images of St. Luke .

• Iconography of the Presentation
• This Picture

Photographed at the church by Richard Stracke, shared under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license .

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Europe 1300 - 1800

Course: europe 1300 - 1800   >   unit 2.

• Siena in the Late Gothic, an introduction
• Duccio, Maestà
• Duccio, Maestà (quiz)
• Duccio, The Rucellai Madonna
• Duccio, Rucellai Madonna (quiz)
• Duccio, The Virgin and Child with Saints Dominic and Aurea
• Ambrogio Lorenzetti, Palazzo Pubblico frescos: Allegory and effect of good and bad government
• Lorenzetti, Allegory and Effect of Good and Bad Government (quiz)

Lorenzetti, Presentation of Jesus in the Temple

• Pietro Lorenzetti, Birth of the Virgin
• Simone Martini, Saint Louis of Toulouse
• Simone Martini, Maesta
• Simone Martini, Annunciation
• Simone Martini's Annunciation (quiz)
• Siena in the 1300s

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The Presentation in the Temple

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The theme of humanism is well portrayed in Raphael's The Presentation in the Temple which is also known as Oddi altar-Predella. It is a theme that shows peoples’ divine responsibility in promoting human welfare.

In Raphael's The Presentation in the Temple, humanism is portrayed as the belief that man and not God has the mandate as the measure of everything. And since man has the capacity to reason, he is the one in control of his destiny. And so Raphael, the humanistic artist brings out details of the figures, drama and realism in The Presentation in the Temple.

It is still an existing drawing by Raphael that shows a tremendous extent of thought and details in which he portrays The Presentation in the Temple. It is an allegory that depicts Jesus' presentation as an infant in the Temple in Jerusalem. An initial episode of Jesus’ on earth where he was inducted into Judaism in the Temple that was at Jerusalem. It was a ceremony that combined the firstborn’s redemption and the purification.

So the theme of humanism here is given in graphic details where the faces of the priest, Mary the mother of Jesus and baby Jesus show the human side of life. Baby Jesus' attachment to the mother, yet he is part of the Holy Trinity shows the mandate of man in the promotion of humanity’s wellbeing. Raphael was an expert who realistically depicted emotion in great depth and this brought life to his paintings. The serenity of the background portrays a masterful combination of humanity and nature. But the greatest impressive scenes are the ones found in predella. A predella was a raised secondary section of an altar in an Italian painting. Raphael masterfully brought out the spacious spaces which open out underneath the Annunciation colonnades. He artistically curved out a free atmosphere of high quality in the Presentation in the Temple.

The above scenes that were painted with excellence foretold Raphael’s amazing three-dimensional insight of his future Vatican artistic compositions. The metaphoric scenes in The Presentation in the Temple were painted during Raphael’s ancient era and had a biblical theme or story. Here the Church would act as a patron while the art stood as the servant. The Presentation in the Temple and other works of Raphael’s contemporaries would act as instructors and consolers of the Christians or the faithful. And so the church through Raphael and his contemporaries’ works were used as instruments of recruiting converts to the Church. Hence, the prestigious adornment of the wall and altar. The Presentation in the Temple was symbolic and a portrayal of the reality of things. It was art for religious purposes and not art for the sake of art.

The Presentation in the Temple was a tempera painting done by a panel (board). A Tempera painting is executed with the use of pigment that is ground in a water-miscible gel to bring out the desired image. Raphael used dry pigments and binding adhesive to create this picture. Tempera was traditionally made by hand-grinding, dry-powdered colours and a diversity of plant gums. The Presentation in the Temple was commissioned by the Oddi family. It was placed at the altar of the chapel in the Church of San Francesco al Prato in Perugia, Italy. It is now housed in the Vatican Pinacoteca. In 1797, the Presentation in the Temple was taken to the Musée Napoleon in Paris and brought back to Vatican Pinacoteca in 1815.

At the onset of his painting career, Raphael was influenced by Perugino, Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo. And in later years, he was influenced by Donato Bramante, the very first architect called to rebuild Rome’s St Peter's Holy Basilica and thereby Raphael got to know and work with Pope Julius II. Raphael's mastery in depicting peoples’ facial expressions and positions endeared him to thousands then and millions today of art lovers. His works reveal his artistic genius and technical prowess that brought him fame in his days and even today. Even today, Raphael stands out as a balanced painter and his paintings still act as keystones of Italian Renaissance in art.

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Tom Gurney in an art history expert. He received a BSc (Hons) degree from Salford University, UK, and has also studied famous artists and art movements for over 20 years. Tom has also published a number of books related to art history and continues to contribute to a number of different art websites. You can read more on Tom Gurney here.

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The Presentation at the Temple

Presentation at the Temple