Cleveland Museum of Art
Christ as the Man of Sorrows between the Virgin and St. John
Martin SchongauerLinkedCulture matchlcp-a6ab91b43bd5
- Date
- 1470–75
- Medium
- engraving
- Culture
- Germany
- Department
- Prints
- Institution
- Cleveland Museum of Art
- Object ID
- 118662
From the Cleveland Museum of Art record
Prints of the Man of Sorrow were widely widespread in Northern Europe after the mid-15th century. The image portrays Christ naked above the waist, wearing the crown of thorns, and displaying the wounds of the Passion marking his hands and side. The Virgin Mary and Saint John the Evangelist flank Christ and mourn his death. Images like these functioned as devotional tools meant to help the faithful to meditate on the Lord's suffering. By showing Christ's hand over his chest and the Virgin's hand on his side, he focused the viewer's attention on Christ's wounds. Similarly, Saint John's compassionate gaze provides a model of empathy for the beholder. The Virgin's garment gently intrudes into the space of the viewer, as if to invite the beholder to participate more closely in this scene of compassion.
The authoritative record is held by Cleveland Museum of Art. LinkedCulture surfaces this object and its connections; it does not alter institutional metadata.
Get printable QR codesHide QR codes
Open QR codes for this object page and the museum record. They stay collapsed until needed.
Provenance & credit
As published by the source institution. Coverage varies — not every institution's open-data feed includes ownership history.
- Credit line
- Dudley P. Allen Fund
- Provenance
- with Richard H. Zinser, New York | 1939: Purchased by the Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
Related across collections
Semantically similar works from Cleveland Museum of Art and other institutions.
Christ on the Cross Between Mary and Saint John
Art Institute of Chicago
#60889
Christ as the Man of Sorrows
Getty Museum
#3b955177-25d2-449f-a8b6-65c305bca2db
Fragment from Christ Carrying the Cross: Mourning Virgin
Art Institute of Chicago
#183006
The Man of Sorrows with Soldier
Minneapolis Institute of Art
#54023
The Virgin and Saint John the Evangelist
Art Institute of Chicago
#25787
Christ on the Cross
Cleveland Museum of Art
#109146
The Passion: Christ on the Cross
Cleveland Museum of Art
#112044
Man of Sorrows by the Column
Minneapolis Institute of Art
#47071
The Man of Sorrows
Art Institute of Chicago
#50163
Christ, Man of Sorrows, Mocked by a Soldier, frontispiece from The Large Passion
Art Institute of Chicago
#19534
Jesus Christ Parting from the Virgin to go and Suffer Death
Art Institute of Chicago
#45353
The Man of Sorrows
Minneapolis Institute of Art
#46774