Adoration of the Child and the angels with the instruments of the Passion

Considering its size, this small painting was probably intended for a private patron.

Here Jacopo Bassano depicts the Virgin kneeling on the ground, adoring her Son. The Child’s tragic destiny is foretold by the instruments of the Passion carried by the angels: the cross, the lance, the nails, the pillar and the crown of thorns. There is a strong contrast between the joyful dance of the angelic figures, landing lightly on soft clouds, and the instruments of torture. The whole scene, the subject of which is perhaps inspired by engravings by Schiavone, is centred on this strident dichotomy, aimed at clearly expressing “that pathetic attitude, typical of Counter-Reformation devotion, all founded on the expression of sentiment” (Villa).

The almost monochrome tone of the painting, featuring a very small range of delicate colours applied with rapid, nervous brush strokes, emphasises the sense of pathos of the scene, illuminated by a few flashes of light that brighten the red sky of sunset and the Madonna’s robe.

When the work became part of the Civic Art Gallery in Palazzo Chiericati in 1973, it was already attributed for certain to Jacopo Bassano. At first it was thought that Bassano might have painted it towards 1540, but later studies have favoured a later date, in the years 1556-1557, when the artist came closer to the Neo-Mannerism of Venetian painting.