Kneeling Angel

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This elegant angel was originally part of a group of statuettes depicting either the Annunciation to the Virgin or Christ as the Man of Sorrows; if the latter, the angel's crossed hands may have held Instruments of Passion. The angel's refined features, the loose curls of long hair, and the fluid treatment of the folds in the thin drapery recall a group of alabaster sculptures from a retable with the Crucifixion and the Twelve Apostles formerly in Santa Maria delle Grazie, Rimini- Covignano (now in the Städtische Galerie Liebieghaus, Frankfurt). The anonymous artists responsible for the ensemble probably worked in the Burgundian Lowlands or the Rhineland, but, as the Rimini altar suggests, they appear to have produced many sculptures in alabaster for export. The personal style of the Rimini Master is closely linked to the widespread, so- called International Gothic style of about 1400, seen in this and many other alabaster statuettes of the first half of the fifteenth century.

Medieval Art and The Cloisters

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum's collection of medieval and Byzantine art is among the most comprehensive in the world. Displayed in both The Met Fifth Avenue and in the Museum's branch in northern Manhattan, The Met Cloisters, the collection encompasses the art of the Mediterranean and Europe from the fall of Rome in the fourth century to the beginning of the Renaissance in the early sixteenth century. It also includes pre-medieval European works of art created during the Bronze Age and early Iron Age.

Metropolitan Museum of Art