Madonna with the Long Neck

Infobox Painting

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image_size=250px
title=La Madonna del Collo Lungo"
The Madonna with the Long Neck
or Madonna and Child with Angels and St. Jerome
artist=Parmigianino
year=1503-40
type=Oil on wood
height=216
width=132
height_inch=
width_inch =
city=Florence
museum=Uffizi

"The Madonna of the Long Neck" ( _it. La Madonna del Collo Lungo), also known as Madonna and Child with Angels and St. Jerome, is an Italian High Renaissance oil painting by the Italian painter Parmigianino in 1535, depicting Madonna and Child with angels. The painting remains incomplete because of Parmigianino's death in 1540.

Description

The painting depicts Virgin Mary as Madonna, seated on a high pedestal and swathed in luxurious robes, holding a rather large baby Jesus on her lap. On her right are visible four angels crowding around the Madonna and adoring the Christ. On the Madonna's left is an enigmatic scene, with a row of marble columns and the emaciated figure of St. Jerome. A depiction of St. Jerome was required by the commissioner because of the saints connection with the worship of the Virgin Mary. The painting is popularly called "Madonna of the Long Neck" because "the painter, in his eagerness to make the Holy Virgin look graceful and elegant, has given her a neck like that of a swan.""The Story of Art", E.H. Gombrich. 1950] On the unusual arrangement of figures, art historian E. H. Gombrich writes:

"Instead of distributing his figures in equal pairs on both sides of the Madonna, he crammed a jostling crowd of angels into a narrow corner, and left the other side wide open to show the tall figure of the prophet, so reduced in size through the distance that he hardly reaches the Madonna's knee. There can be no doubt, then, that if this be madness there is method in it. The painter wanted to be unorthodox. He wanted to show that the classical solution of perfect harmony is not the only solution conceivable; that natural simplicity is one way of achieving beauty, but that there are less direct ways of getting interesting effects for sophisticated lovers of art. Whether we like or dislike the road he took, we must admit that he was consistent. Indeed, Parmigianino and all the artists of his time who deliberately sought to create something new and unexpected, even at the expense of the 'natural' beauty established by the great masters, were perhaps the first 'modern' artists. We shall see, indeed, that what is now called 'modern' art may have had its roots in a similar urge to avoid the obvious and achieve effects which differ from conventional natural beauty."

A product of the Mannerist school of art, Parmigianino has distorted nature for his own artistic purposes. The Madonna is of hardly human proportions, with long, elegant fingers; and is almost twice the size of the angels to her right."100 Masterpieces", Hamlyn Publishing, 1986. ISBN 086136 6921.] Of interest in the Madonna's right foot: it rests on cushions that appear to be only a few inches away from the picture plane, but the foot itself seems to project beyond it, and is thus on "our" side of the canvas, breaking the conventions of a framed picture. Jesus is also extremely large for a baby and he lies precariously on Mary's lap as if about to fall at any moment.

References