Painting and Sculpture

Christ's Appearance to Mary Magdalene after the Resurrection

Christ's Appearance to Mary Magdalene after the Resurrection is a painting by Russian artist Alexander Ivanov (1806–1858), completed in 1835. The painting is housed in the State Russian Museum in St. Petersburg (inventory number Zh-5263). It measures 242 × 321 cm. The canvas depicts Mary Magdalene and Jesus Christ in a life-size two-figure composition. The painting depicts the moment in the Gospel story when Mary Magdalene recognises the risen Christ. However, he stops her impulse by telling her, "Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father". The initial phase of the project, comprising the creation of sketches and studies, commenced in 1833. Ivanov completed the large canvas between 1834 and 1835 in his studio in Rome. Upon completion of the painting, it was successfully exhibited first in Rome and then, in mid-1836, in St Petersburg. The Imperial Academy of Arts awarded Ivanov the title of Academician for this painting. This allowed the artist to extend his stay in Italy and provided an important foundation for his magnum opus, the canvas The Appearance of Christ Before the People, which Ivanov worked on between 1837 and 1857. The artist and critic Alexandre Benois wrote that the painting Christ's Appearance to the Magdalene showed "all of [Ivanov's] skill in nudity and drapery." At the same time, according to Benois, in the image of the Magdalene one can see "something that shows what understanding of tragedy Ivanov had already reached, what kind of heart reader he had become, how deeply he could feel, to the point of tears, the tender story of the Gospel". The art historian Mikhail Alpatov noted that the canvas was "a typical work of academic classicism", yet the artist simultaneously achieved "a grandeur that the academicians did not know". In both figures depicted by Ivanov "there is such a majestic dignity that is more characteristic of the heroes of classical tragedy than of the characters of the Gospel legend".

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See also

• ▸Audrey Jones Beck
• ▸Farm Security Administration
• ▸Cecil Jay

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Text from Wikipedia; plate via Wikimedia Commons. Text CC BY-SA 4.0; plate freely licensed (see Commons). Source record. Images and catalogue data are reproduced from open-access collections.