The Repentant Magdalen
Georges de La Tourc. 1635/1640
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
Washington, DC, United States
According to the tenets of the 17th–century Catholic church, Mary Magdalene was an example of the repentant sinner and consequently a symbol of the Sacrament of Penance. According to legend, Mary led a dissolute life until her sister Martha persuaded her to listen to Jesus Christ. She became one of Christ's most devoted followers and he absolved her of her former sins.
In Georges de La Tour's somber canvas Mary is shown in profile seated at a table. A candle is the source of light in the composition, but the light also carries a spiritual meaning as it casts a golden glow on the saint's face and the objects assembled on the table. The candle light silhouettes Mary's left hand which rests on a skull that is placed on a book. The skull is reflected in a mirror. The skull and mirror are emblems of _vanitas_, implying the transience of life.
The simplification of forms, reduced palette, and attention to details evoke a haunting silence that is unique to La Tour's work. La Tour's intense naturalism rendered religious allegory accessible to every viewer. Although his work is deeply spiritual in tone, the solidity and massing of the forms reveal the same emphasis on clarity and symmetry that pervaded contemporary history painting and was a hallmark of French baroque art.
- Title: The Repentant Magdalen
- Creator: Georges de La Tour
- Date Created: c. 1635/1640
- Physical Dimensions: overall: 113 × 92.7 cm (44 1/2 × 36 1/2 in.) framed: 142.24 × 124.46 × 10.8 cm (56 × 49 × 4 1/4 in.)
- Provenance: Marquise de Caulaincourt, by 1877; by inheritance to his sister, comtesse de Andigné, by 1911.[1] art market, Paris; André Fabius, Paris, by 1936;[2] purchased 1974 by NGA. [1] On the back of the stretcher is the stencil of Etienne-François Haro (1827-1897) and his son Henri (1855-1911), important Parisian restorers and vendors of art supplies, as well as artists themselves. An entry in the Haro account book for 9 October 1877 provides the early provenance, information that was first published by Pierre Rosenberg and Jacques Thuillier, "George de La Tour," _Revue du Louvre et des Musées de France_ 22, no. 2 (1972): 161, followed, with slightly differing details, by Pierre Rosenberg and François Macé de l'Épinay, _Georges de La Tour: vie et oeuvre_, Fribourg, 1973: 140, and Benedict Nicolson and Christopher Wright, _Georges de La Tour_, London, 1974: 175. [2] The three references to the painting that discuss its provenance (see note 1) provide differing accounts of when and where Fabius acquired the painting: Rosenberg and Thuillier 1972 say 1936; Rosenberg and Macé de l'Épinay 1973 say a public sale in 1936; Nicolson and Wright 1974 say the Paris art market before 1936.
- Medium: oil on canvas
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