Bible Cycles in Art
BIBLE CYCLES IN ART
By Bible cycle is meant an organic complex of visual representations intended to illustrate either various phases or aspects of one Biblical subject, or many Biblical subjects bound together by a single "thematic" idea.
EARLY CHRISTIAN
The decorations found in the catacombs and on the earliest Christian tombs are the first examples of Bible cycles in art. These date from the 2d and 3d centuries a.d. and are based upon themes of a symbolical nature. A few isolated exceptions, such as the 2d-century frescoes in the cemetery of Priscilla (Rome) of the "Virgin, the Child and Isaia" and the "Breaking of the Bread," are of a more concrete narrative character. The cycles of symbolical reference are interpreted according to the taste and style of composition characteristic of contemporary late Imperial painting. With only a few strokes of striking visual concreteness, the figures are depicted either alone or in groups on a white background, skillfully arranged in the allotted spaces and unified by the symmetry of the composition. The pictorial cycle of this "impressionistic" type succeeds, despite its sketchlike quality, in evoking with immediacy people and events from the Bible stories. Presented, as they are, in a single organic unit, the figures are gradually transformed into "symbols," sensible images of transcendent values.
Sepulchral Art. Early Christian catacomb and tomb art, especially in Rome, provides typical examples of the Bible cycles. The frescoes in a cubicle of the Roman catacomb of Saints Peter and Marcellinus have figures of Lazarus, Moses, Noah praying, and the three Magi on the walls; on the ceiling, in the center, is the Good Shepherd between four scenes where the stories of Jonah alternate with orans figures. These Biblical representations are clearly symbolic of faith in the divinity of the Redeemer risen from the dead. Also typical are the representations of Daniel in the lions' den in the catacomb of Lucina, or those of Noe in the ark in the catacomb of Domitilla, both symbolizing the mystery of the Resurrection. This kind of cycle was created to present the Biblical incidents to viewers with an adequate spiritual preparation. The depicted events recall facts or ideas that were well known and whose transcendent meaning could be evoked from the images presented.
A similar aim is seen in the early Christian tombs. Here, the plastic figuration tends to acquire a conscious artistic autonomy, and in addition there is greater interest in the narrative as such, over and above the idea that it symbolizes (sarcophagus of Jona, no. 119, Lateran Museum, Rome). The general theme of the Resurrection of Christ, recalled in a series of episodes from the Old and New Testaments, is overshadowed by the capricious ornament, laden with Hellenistic accents. Analogous in spirit but more typically Roman in style and dating from the height of the 4th century, is the sarcophagus of Junius Bassius (Grottoes of the Vatican). Lastly, of decidedly narrative character and showing a conscious intent to celebrate the mystery, is the sarcophagus of the Passion (no. 171; Lateran, Rome). Here the emphasis is on the cross in the central panel, surmounted by the monogram of Christ within a triumphal crown. There are many other contemporary examples similar in spirit and emphasis in which, however, the youthful and triumphant figure of Christ usually appears on a throne in place of the cross.
4th and 5th Centuries. Bible cycles found in the basreliefs of sarcophagi of the 4th and 5th centuries are clearly narrative in character and have a strong dramatic unity (nos. 135, 125, 155, and 183, Lateran Museum, Rome; sarcophagus of Adelfia, Syracuse Museum). They have a figurative quality that is free of the mannerisms of late classical art, and is founded on a previously unknown historical understanding of religious truths. Later, this conception became a strong determining force in neo-Latin art and civilization.
Among the earliest exemplifications of this tendency are the mosaics of the nave of St. Mary Major in Rome, depicting stories from the Old Testament, and those of the triumphal arch, with the glorification of Mary and stories of the childhood of Christ. The cycle was executed during the pontificate of Sixtus III (432–40). The mosaics of the nave are clearly in the Western tradition; they are constructed with a dramatic power and a solid sense of volumes, as if they had been produced by "tachist" brush strokes. In the triumphal arch, on the other hand, the symmetrical rows of flat-frontal figures produce an effect of hieratic solemnity.
Only a few decades later, the mosaics of the triumphal arch of the Roman basilica of St. Paul-Outside-the-Walls, created by order of Galla Placidia in the last years of her reign, show the fulfillment of the early Western style. The 24 Elders of the Revelation are represented in a rhythmic procession in two parallel lines. Clad in white robes, they stand out majestically against a gold background, which emphasizes the strikingly tragic and severe face of Christ the Judge in the center. The face of Christ is placed in even stronger relief by a radiant halo of sharply contrasting color.
Art of this period suggested intimate and profound sensitivity that was to strengthen the historical consciousness
of the neo-Latin world. Foreshadowings of the coming changes of values can be seen in fundamental works of the 5th century: the wooden doors of St. Sabina in Rome, with events from the life of Christ and of Moses, and those of St. Ambrose in Milan, with episodes from the life of David; also (though in the 6th century) the Evangeliary of St. Augustine at Cambridge (Corpus Christi College, MS 286), and the mosaics of the chapel of S. Vittore in Ciel d'Oro in Milan.
Ravenna. In Italy the passing of the early style tradition is evident in the mosaics of Ravenna, especially in the New Testament series of the nave of S. Apollinare Nuovo, which dates from the period of Theodoric. A highly refined culture is evident in the pictures filled with Christological scenes, on the upper parts of the walls, where the serene balance of the composition and the softly blended colors give the story depicted an unreal and dreamlike distance. The dramatic austerity of the mosaics of St. Paul is exhibited through silent, linear figures of far greater rhythmic rigor—in the series of the Prophets, on a golden background between the windows; as in the two "Theophanies" around Mary and Christ below. In the mosaics of S. Apollinare in Classe, the most subtle harmonies of color and composition envelop in an immobile silence scenes depicted with a striking descriptive power. There is in them an almost surrealistic clarity.
The same values are continued with more consistency in the mosaic cycles of the presbytery and the apse of
S. Vitale at Ravenna (6th century), which celebrate the prefiguration of the Eucharistic Sacrifice in the deeds of Moses, Abraham, and Melchizedek.
EARLY MEDIEVAL
A complicated theological program guided the development of the Biblical cycles in mosaic work, which superseded the earlier abstract type of decoration, in the basilicas of the Holy Apostles and of Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, of the Dormition of the Virgin in Nicaea (destroyed 1921–22), and of St. Demetrius at Salonika. The mosaics of the latter closely resemble contemporary work in S. Vitale.
Byzantine. The initial golden period of Byzantine civilization, from the beginning of the 6th century to the iconoclastic crisis, presents the triumph of the Biblical cycle, especially in the field of illumination work, of which authentic masterpieces are still extant: the Vienna Genesis and the Paris Gospel of St. Matthew from Sinope (Bibliothèque Nationale); the so-called Purple Codex of Rossano (Treasury of the Cathedral), whole pages of which are decorated with miniatures in which the almost complete disappearance of landscape elements and nervous proportions accompany the abstract theological theme of the typological relation between the prophecies of the Old Testament and the events of the New Testament; the 6th-century Syrian Codexes of Paris (Bibliothèque Nationale) and the Gospel Book of Rabbula (Laurentian Library, Florence).
In Rome the principal monumental cycles of the 7th and 8th centuries are characterized by fidelity to the classical tradition (frescoes of S. Maria Antiqua and those in the catacomb of Commodilla; mosaics in the oratory of John VII) and by the presence of a Greek stylistic manner analagous, for example, to that of the mosaic cycle of St. Catherine at Sinai (7th century). Thus Christian art, both Eastern and Western, reflected the consequences of the iconoclastic crisis whose effects persisted even after its official end in 843. Only in this period did Biblical cycles of great importance reappear, in general, in European painting, sculpture, and illumination work, and not only in art of Byzantine inspiration. More ancient examples of cycles had appeared in Rome or within its sphere of influence, for instance in the mosaics of the triumphal arch, of the apse, and of the chapel of St. Zeno in S. Prassede in Rome (early 9th century), and the frescoes of the church of S. Vincenzo of Volturno (826–43).
In the Byzantine world during the middle decades of the 9th century, after more than a century there was, on the whole, a resumption of the forms and artistic preferences of the period immediately preceding the iconoclastic crisis. Important examples are the Vatican copy (MS gr. 699) of the Cosmographia Cristiana of Cosma Indicopleuste, dating from the second half of the century, and the collection of the Sermons of St. Gregory of Paris (Bibliothèque Nationale, gr. 510) executed in Constantinople around 880 for Basilius I, founder of the Macedonian dynasty.
Several great Italian mosaic cycles of a later date also belong to the sphere of Byzantine artistic culture; these include the cycles of Martorana and of the Cappella Palatina in Palermo (c. 1150); New Testament mosaics in the cathedral of Cefalù (c. 1150); mosaics of the cathedral of Monreale (c. 1776–89); those of the nave (c. 1150) and the porch (early 13th century) in St. Mark's, Venice; and mosaics of the cathedral of Torcello (c. 1210–20).
Carolingian. In Western Europe, the artistic renaissance under charlemagne (emperor 800–14) was accompanied by a revival of interest in history that was manifested in the triumphal return of cycles of religious, and especially Biblical, subjects regarded as histories valid in themselves over and above any symbolism. The admirable frescoes of S. Maria Foras Portas at Castelseprio belong to the Carolingian period, even though their style springs from an Oriental culture, and they were probably executed by Greek artists. The frescoes depict the story of Mary and the childhood of Jesus according to the apocryphal gospels of the Oriental tradition. Local artists were responsible for the almost contemporary frescoes of St. John at Münster (in a high valley of the Grisons), which narrate with stiff forms in the Byzantine style, but with expressionistic vigor, the stories of David and of Christ along the walls of the nave. The exaltation of the Redeemer is depicted in the three apses, with the Last Judgment on the inner facade. Such an arrangement
became common in western Europe during the Middle Ages.
Manuscript Illumination. From this period on, there was an immense flowering of Biblical cycles in the illuminated manuscripts of the Gospels, of the Psalters, and, in general, of religious books. There was a resurgence of classic influences in the sphere of Byzantine art, beginning before the 9th century and continuing into the succeeding centuries (Paris Psalter, Bibliothèque Nationale, gr. 139; the Vatican Bible, Reg. Svev. gr. I; the Joshua Roll, Vatican Library, Palat. graeco. gr. 431), characterized by very conservative tendencies both in style and in iconography. Only in the 11th century, for example, does a Book of the Gospels of Paris (Bibliothèque Nationale, gr. 74) offer one of the first examples of the insertion of the Gospel parables into an iconographic setting of strictly Byzantine origin. Analogous conservative characteristics and tendencies appear also in 11th-century monumental cycles such as that of the church of St. Luke in Phocis, the mosaics in Hagia Sophia in Constantinople, and the mosaic cycles of the church of Nea Moni of Chios and the church at Daphni. In these last two, however, the New Testament iconography is relatively renewed by themes from the apocryphal gospels and above all by themes freed from their traditional liturgical references.
Biblical illumination of German manuscripts by the school of Ada (9th century) limits figurative art almost entirely to the frontispieces, full-page illuminations, and small scenes contained within the capital letters. Several characteristic cycles of the Passion done in ivory can be attributed to the influence of the school of Ada; scenes are carved in a closely fitted series of squares surrounding the central figure of Christ Crucified, as in the ivory cover of the Codex at Munich (c. 870; Clm. 4452) and the ivory of Narbonne (9th to 10th century; Cathedral Museum). Throughout the 10th and 11th centuries, under the influence of the Ottonian civilization, the German illumination work of the school of Reichenau, fresco cycles of St. George at Oberzell, St. Sylvester at Goldbach and of Echternach display a taste for narrative that displays complete stylistic freedom; its fundamental roots are classical and early Christian in origin, but to it have been added the influences of the Carolingian renaissance. Among the best examples are: Codex Egberti, of Trier; the Evangelistary of Otto III, at Munich (Clm. 4453); the Golden Evangelistary of Henry III, at the Escorial; Codex aureus Epternacensis at Nuremberg; Book of the Pericopes of Henry II, at Munich (Clm. 4452); and the Evangelistary of Otto at Aquisgrana.
English illumination work is related also to the school of Reichenau. The principal centers in England, Winchester and Canterbury, produced the Benedictional of St. Aethelwold by Godeman, School of Winchester, 975 to 980 (British Museum); the Evangelistary of Grimbald (British Museum, Add. 34890, London); Caedmon's Poem (Bodleian Library, Oxford). The same influence is apparent in other sectors of the figurative arts: the Biblical cycles of the Milanese and Spanish ivories; the ciborium of St. Ambrose and the Arca Santa of Orvieto; the bronze doors of Bernward in the cathedral of Hildesheim; and the cathedrals of Augusta and of Novgorod.
HIGH MEDIEVAL
The Bible cycles of the Romanesque and Gothic periods manifest an increased complexity in their arrangement and give evidence of new artistic and spiritual values.
Romanesque. From the 11th century to the beginning of the 12th, Romanesque sculpture was almost entirely devoted to Biblical figures, arranged in true, organic cycles. French sculpture was the guiding source of European taste. The leading schools were those of Aquitaine (St. Saturnin in Toulouse and the abbey church of Moissac); of Burgundy (the abbey church of Cluny, the priory of Anzy-le-Duc, and St. Lazare at Autun); of Provence (St. Gilles at Saint-Gilles-du-Gard and St. Trophîme at Arles); and of Auvergne (Saint-Foy at Conques). In Italian sculpture, in addition to schools such as the Lombardian and Emilian, there are individual artists of primary importance. Among them was wiligelmo, who created (c. 1099–1106) one of the noblest Biblical bas-reliefs of Genesis in the cathedral of Modena. In the intimate dialogue between our first parents and a very human God, as in the tragedy of Cain, Wiligelmo exalts human energy, for the first time in medieval Europe, with a force equal to the dolorous physical appearance of the bodies, which seem almost to burst forth from the confines of the limited space.
Gothic. The cycles of the Old and New Testament by Benedetto Antelami in the baptistery of Parma, at Borgo S. Donnino, and S. Andrea at Vercelli (c. 1196–1225) display a dynamism of genuinely Gothic inspiration. Parallels to the work of Antelami may be found in the oldest examples of the French Bible moralisé and the German Biblia pauperum. The sculpture of the Gothic Biblical cycles of France and northern Europe in the 13th and 14th centuries is dramatic and moving. The important masterworks include the reliefs of the Old Testament of the north portal of the cathedral of Chartres; the sculptures of the "Master of Nuremberg" at Magonza and Nuremberg; the Biblical reliefs of the choir of Nôtre-Dame of Paris; and the portals with New Testament cycles around the "Crucifixion" of St. Gilles, Strasbourg, and Reims.
Stained-glass windows presented Bible cycles in the 13th, 14th, and 15th centuries, reaching extraordinary mastery in the New Testament windows of the south nave of the cathedral of Chartres and those of Saint Remi at Reims. The tradition of the Bible cycle in manuscript illumination was continued by the celebrated miniaturist Jean de Berry, and by Bohemian miniaturists, especially those of the court of Charles IV of Prague.
The 13th-century Italian artist Niccolò Pisano created the Biblical cycles of the pulpits of the baptistery of Pisa and of the cathedral of Siena, and collaborated with his son Giovanni on the sculptures of the fountains of Perugia. He combined the unity characteristic of classic Latin art with lively action and sensitivity of style. The Nativity and the Crucifixion at Pisa and the Massacre of the Innocents and the Last Judgment at Siena are revivals of classical sculpture.
The work of Arnolfo di Cambio, and of Giovanni Pisano, and their collaborators was inspired by the art of Niccolò Pisano. In the cycles from the Old and New Testament in the pulpits of the cathedral of Pisa and in S. Andrea at Pistoia, as well as on the façade of the cathedral of Siena, Giovanni Pisano expressed power in clear Gothic style.
Influence of St. Francis. The effect upon 13th-century Italian art of Franciscan spirituality, in particular with reference to the iconography of the New Testament, was visible in a new interpretation of the humanity of Christ. A new version of the "suffering Christ" replacing the medieval conception of the Crucified Christ as the Judge, or King, is exemplified by the "Crucifixion" of Giunta Pisano in S. Domenico, Bologna.
The New Testament cycles in mosaic of the life of the Virgin by Pietro Cavallini in S. Maria in Trastevere (c. 1291) and the frescoes of St. Cecilia in Rome, though in a certain sense parallel to the classical revival of Niccolò Pisano, reflect also the new iconography of Franciscan origin. The same may be said for the work of Torriti and the so-called "Master of Isacco," who produced the frescoes in the church of St. Francis in Assisi, and, above all, for the Old and New Testament cycles created by Cimabue in the upper church of St. Francis in Assisi. In paintings of the "Assumption" and the "Crucifixion" the Florentine artist combined ancient iconography with a fresh human concreteness.
New Testament iconography was given a new expression in the same period in the cycle of stories of Mary and Christ painted by the Sienese artist Duccio in a series of paintings for the front and back of the altar, comprising his famous "Majesty" (Museum of the Cathedral, Siena). Duccio's pictorial invention is equal to that of Cimabue in exquisiteness of style.
EARLY RENAISSANCE
At the beginning of the 14th century, giotto painted the life of Christ and of Mary in fresco (1303–1305) in the chapel of the Scrovegni in Padua. Giotto's psychological insight underlines in the divine history the essential motives of the soul and of human action, presenting them with an almost violent clarity and showing a masterly disposition of the figures in space. A revolution in the relations between man and his natural surroundings foreshadowed the humanistic arrangement achieved in the 15th century in the Florentine Renaissance.
Representative of the continuing transition in Bible cycles are the bas-reliefs of Andrea Pisano on the doors of the baptistery and the bell tower of Florence; Ghiberti's doors for the same baptistery; the sculptures of the baptismal font of the cathedral of Siena; and the Biblical bas-reliefs of Jacopo della Quercia in the portal of St. Petronius at Bologna.
Masaccio and Donatello. The frescoes of Masaccio in the Brancacci chapel of the Carmine of Florence, including the "Banishment of Adam and Eve" and the "Stories of St. Peter" (1424–1427), emphasize in principal figures like Christ and St. Peter an emotion that binds the landscape and the men into a "perspective" unity at once both physical and spiritual, and of striking epic power.
In the cycle of the Passion sculptured by Donatello in the pulpits of S. Lorenzo in Florence, moral suffering is rendered in a tormented style. In the "Deposition" the important figures and all three crosses are in dramatic high relief; moreover, the center perspective toward which all the architectural and construction lines lead, is placed outside the limits of the composition. In this way the artist represented the tragic human events of the scene centered on Mary and the dead body of Christ as a "fragment" of a much greater picture whose limits cannot be measured by human means.
But formal balance was retained in the cycles of frescoes of Fra Angelico portraying scenes from the life of Mary and Christ in the convent of San Marco in Florence and the stories of Saints Stephen and Lawrence from the Acts of the Apostles in the chapel of Nicholas V in the Vatican. The interpretation from a humanistic viewpoint given by the Florentine Renaissance to Biblical subjects virtually dominated European art until the beginning of the 17th century. Thereafter, new interpretations affected the form of the Bible cycles.
Northern Symbolism and Italian Rationalism. One case, however, of striking independence stands out in painting in the "Mystical Lamb" of Ghent, painted in 1439 by Van Eyck. This is a huge complex of the greatest themes of the Old and New Testament, skillfully bound together by light and by symbolical elements, the whole center of interest being the Lamb. In effect the densely populated background is flooded with the sunlight of a bright morning hour.
Flemish art continued through the 15th and 16th centuries to express religious themes in a symbolic manner. The use of symbols was sometimes almost obsessive and in strong contrast to the clear, analytical, concrete use of pictorial material. Works of this kind include the "Seven Capital Sins," the "Parables," the "Garden of Delights," and the many aspects of the Passion by Hieronymus Bosch; and the "Triumph of Death" and the "Parables" of Pieter Brueghel.
Italian Renaissance painting, on the other hand, was marked by a rational interpretation of Biblical themes. The emotional content was not diminished, but there was clearer harmony in the forms and more concrete employment of human elements. Among the most important Italian cycles around the turn of the 15th century were the frescoes with parallel scenes of the Old and New Testaments executed by perugino, Pinturicchio, Signorelli, Ghirlandaio, Botticelli, C. Rosselli, and Piero di Cosimo on the lower part of the walls of the sistine chapel in the Vatican; the fresco cycle of the "Novissima" by Signorelli in the cathedral of Orvieto (c. 1499); the New Testament ceramics of the della robbias in the sanctuary of Alvernia; and the frescoes of Fra Lippo Lippi in the cathedral of Prato and of Gozzoli in the chapel of the Medici. The subject of Piero della Francesca's fresco cycle of the "Legend of the Cross" in the church of St. Francis in Arezzo was a derivation from the sacred history recorded in the New Testament. Piero's cycle, as well as the frescoes executed in the 16th century by Raphael in the Vatican stanze, synthesize the artistic and religious culture both of the artists and of the civilization in which they lived. The "Last Supper" of Leonardo da Vinci was the culmination of the synthesis.
HIGH RENAISSANCE TO MODERN
From the late 15th century to the 17th century the Bible cycles in European painting occurred in various and rich succession under the inspiration of earlier art.
Michelangelo. The cyclical works of michelange lo include "Genesis" on the ceiling (1508 to 1512), the "Last Judgment" behind the altar (1536 to 1541) of the Sistine Chapel, and the frescoes of the Pauline Chapel in the Vatican (1546). They are the greatest works of their kind. The artist penetrates the depths of religious mysteries. The ceiling seems so molded by the painting that the cornices around the gigantic scenes appear real and firmly constructed. They bind the composition together and repeat the vibrant movement in the groups of Prophets, Sibyls, and naked figures that animate the interior of the structures. By contrast, in the "Last Judgment" no linear frames obstruct the whirling movement of the bodies, either tossed down or upraised as if by the power in the arm of Christ, who is at the center of a composition marked by continuous vertical ascending and descending movement. The frescoes of the Pauline Chapel show a new contrast. A silent landscape spreads out beyond the tightly knit human group surrounding Peter's inverted cross. The Apostle's figure, with eyes glaring at the viewer, produces a dramatic complement to the rearing, isolated horse in the center of the "Conversion of St. Paul" that serves to measure the distance from the deserted horizon.
Tintoretto and Others. The artistic productions that appeared in the wake of Michelangelo's supreme effort exhibit the widest ranging imagination; they include the colossal and intensely moving cycle of huge canvases of the Old and New Testaments painted by Tintoretto for the Scuola of S. Rocco in Venice (1564 to 1587) and the numerous Biblical paintings of Titian, Veronese, Lotto, and Jacopo Bassano. The spectacular Bible cycles by the "Sacri Monti" of the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries, especially the work of Varallo, are in every sense of the word sacred representations from the plastic, pictorial, and architectural viewpoint.
New Trends. The work of Caravaggio is symptomatic of the progressive decline of interest in the creation of organic Biblical cycles after the Renaissance. Although Caravaggio was a brilliant painter his attention was centered on brief fragments of reality, and then was concentrated in compositions of extreme formal purity, with light audaciously used against solidly dark backgrounds. It was the beginning of a new age in European art, which—with an intensification of impassioned, personal research, and the vivid awareness of the value of the individual—lost contact with the sense of history as a series of universal events in which the individual had a part.
Two fundamental lines of development can be discerned in the 17th and 18th centuries. First, there was a tendency to paint sumptuous, superficial canvases on sacred themes, sometimes for their scenic effects, as in the work of Carracci, Gaulli, Pozzo, Piazzetta, Ricci, and Tiepolo; sometimes for their episodic value, as in the elaborate, affected type of sacred painting produced by Flemish, Dutch, and German artists, as well as those of Brescia and Bologna, which gave rise to genre painting; and sometimes for purely decorative effect, as in Tiepolo's cycle in the cathedral of Udine or that of Guardi in St. Raphael in Venice.
The second line of development tended to render the Biblical theme subjective, either by a tormented, personal search or by a fragmentary view of reality from which the specific sense of the sacred was banished, even though generalized spiritual values remained. The highest point in the art of personal search was reached in the throbbing luminosity of Rembrandt's paintings, which shifted the focus to the human and immeasurable vastness of dark spaces. In the art of generalized spiritual values, while Velázquez made decisive advances, the greatest developments were made in the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries in the social interpretations of Goya and Millet, the chromatic transfigurations of Van Gogh, Gauguin, and Matisse, and the torturous personal testimonies of Emil Nolde and the German expressionists. In his cycle of the "Passion," Rouault attempted to constitute an organic cycle in the precise sense.
After World War II numerous works of art in cycles appeared, though rarely of purely Biblical subjects. Illustrations for the Bible by Marc Chagall (1956) have a quality of dreamlike, pictorial lightness. The "Door of Death" was created by Manzù for St. Peter's, Rome (1963). In it eight stupendous bas-reliefs suggest by broken rhythms the relation between Biblical and presentday events. It is a vertically oriented composition of utmost purity, crowned by the soaring movement of the "Death of the Virgin" and of the "Crucifixion."
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[a. m. romanini]