The Birth of Mary

The Birth of Mary (Nativity of the Virgin)
Artist: Pietro Lorenzetti, Tempera on panel, Size: 188x183cm; Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Siena.

The Birth of Mary (Nativity of the Virgin) is one of Pietro Lorenzetti's best known painting works.
The scene is set in two different rooms, constructed in such a way as to fit the division of the frame into three sections. In the room on the left, filling one compartment of the polyptych, we see Joachim, Mary's father, waiting anxiously. In the background, a lunette and a window open onto the outside, offering a glimpse of just a few details of a Gothic building opposite. The compartments in the middle and on the right house the main scene, set in a room roofed with two cross vaults. Anne is lying on the bed after giving birth to the Virgin, who is being washed by two serving women. The episode is described with feeling and precision: one of the women is pouring warm water into a basin while the other holds the baby and tests the temperature of the water with her hand.
The scene, constructed with studied perspective, is striking for the care that has been taken over the interiors: note the meticulous representation of each tile, each piece of furniture, the cloth covering the bed, the drape that serves as a screen and the ceiling with a double cross vault frescoed with a starry sky.