Cleveland Museum of Art

The Orange Christ

Maurice DenisLinkedCulture matchlcp-ec38b65b9a04

Date

1889

Medium

oil on board

Culture

France

Department

Modern European Painting and Sculpture

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

Object ID

84662

A devout Catholic, Maurice Denis sought to create what he described as “imperishable icons.” In this small painting, he used flat planes of intense colors to conjure emotion in the viewer. Here, a somber group of women, depicted as amorphous black forms, gather around an orange figure of Christ on the cross. The sky is a reddish-purple streaked with green clouds. Pink angels flank the crucified Christ whose head is haloed in brilliant yellow. In this painting, the daring young artist combined religious fervor with unprecedented visual experimentation. As reflected in the two-dimensionality and color blocking in this painting, Denis believed a painting was "a flat surface covered with colors assembled in a certain order."

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