A cameo carved in Brazilian banded agate, white on black: the Crucifixion of Christ (John 19:25–30) after the composition by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld. It is held at its lower corners by a stand of blackened bronze on a slate base.
Hardly any scene from the life of Christ has been depicted as often in the history of Western art as his crucifixion. This is probably because the decisive act of salvation happens here for the Christian, because the scene provides the central symbol, the cross, and because Christ is shown in a peculiar intermediate stage between man and God. In the course of art history it depended in each case on how the artists wanted to see the Lord on the cross: more as a mortal man, or more as a God already removed from the earth. The distinction can be seen in the composition itself. Some artists, such as Albrecht Dürer and Diego Velázquez, depict an individual dying in isolation. Others, mainly in the late Middle Ages and the Baroque period, stage a mass scene with all the people and props mentioned in the Bible.
Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld finds an intermediate solution between mass scene and isolation by creating a monumental main group of seven people, which he frames with the two thieves crucified with Christ on the right and left. The main group and the frame leave three gaps through which one can look into the middle ground or the background. There, one can still sense something of the mass spectacle that such a crucifixion has always been. The soldier with the sponge of vinegar on a reed mediates between the monumental group around the cross and the crowd in the background, who turn away from the cross and thus from Christ.
The monumentality of the original carries over into the cameo, whose relief figures are strongly carved. On the left are John and the two women, of whom Mary, the more active, embraces her son with both arms. On the right Mary Magdalene kneels, caressing the feet of the crucified Christ, while another woman and Nicodemus show their suffering, the one with restraint, the other expressively.
Rising out of this group and dominating it, the crucified Christ stands out. The crown of thorns, the halo of rays and the inscription, on and above the head, are drawn together into a single focal point: there, in the head full of blood and wounds, salvation is concentrated. The T-shape of the cross is related to this as well: it forms the centre post and the lintel of the gate of Paradise, which Christ pushed open for all mankind with his act of redemption. Around him, in a striking contrast within the cameo, is darkness, but he, Christ, is the shining centre.
Materials: Brazilian banded agate, black-white; stand of blackened bronze; slate base
Dimensions: cameo 172 × 163 mm (width × height); overall 190 × 210 × 105 mm (height × width × depth)
A cameo carved in Brazilian banded agate, white on black: the Crucifixion of Christ (John 19:25–30) after the composition by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld. It is held at its lower corners by a stand of blackened bronze on a slate base.
Hardly any scene from the life of Christ has been depicted as often in the history of Western art as his crucifixion. This is probably because the decisive act of salvation happens here for the Christian, because the scene provides the central symbol, the cross, and because Christ is shown in a peculiar intermediate stage between man and God. In the course of art history it depended in each case on how the artists wanted to see the Lord on the cross: more as a mortal man, or more as a God already removed from the earth. The distinction can be seen in the composition itself. Some artists, such as Albrecht Dürer and Diego Velázquez, depict an individual dying in isolation. Others, mainly in the late Middle Ages and the Baroque period, stage a mass scene with all the people and props mentioned in the Bible.
Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld finds an intermediate solution between mass scene and isolation by creating a monumental main group of seven people, which he frames with the two thieves crucified with Christ on the right and left. The main group and the frame leave three gaps through which one can look into the middle ground or the background. There, one can still sense something of the mass spectacle that such a crucifixion has always been. The soldier with the sponge of vinegar on a reed mediates between the monumental group around the cross and the crowd in the background, who turn away from the cross and thus from Christ.
The monumentality of the original carries over into the cameo, whose relief figures are strongly carved. On the left are John and the two women, of whom Mary, the more active, embraces her son with both arms. On the right Mary Magdalene kneels, caressing the feet of the crucified Christ, while another woman and Nicodemus show their suffering, the one with restraint, the other expressively.
Rising out of this group and dominating it, the crucified Christ stands out. The crown of thorns, the halo of rays and the inscription, on and above the head, are drawn together into a single focal point: there, in the head full of blood and wounds, salvation is concentrated. The T-shape of the cross is related to this as well: it forms the centre post and the lintel of the gate of Paradise, which Christ pushed open for all mankind with his act of redemption. Around him, in a striking contrast within the cameo, is darkness, but he, Christ, is the shining centre.
Materials: Brazilian banded agate, black-white; stand of blackened bronze; slate base
Dimensions: cameo 172 × 163 mm (width × height); overall 190 × 210 × 105 mm (height × width × depth)
