Virgin and Child

Virgin and Child

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Virgin is shown with a crown and scepter as the Queen of Heaven. Her scepter, depicted as a rose branch, alludes to the homily of the Virgin as the rose without thorns (or without sin) or as the rose of Jericho that sprang up at the resting places of the Holy Family during the Flight into Egypt. The dove held by the Christ Child represents peace, purity and the Holy Spirit. This work, with its elegant proportions and horizontal, looping drapery folds, is related in style to a large sculpture of the Virgin and Child given to the abbey of St.-Denis in 1340 by Jeanne d'Evreux, the widowed queen of Charles IV. Her tiny book of hours can be found in The Cloisters Treasury.

Medieval Art and The Cloisters

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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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.