The Blessing Christ, the Mourning Virgin, the Mourning St. John the Evangelist

Description These fragments originally adorned a monumental crucifix. The Blessing Christ would have appeared at the top, while Mary and John the Evangelist would have occupied the left and right ends of the cross's horizontal beam. Pietro da Rimini imitated the naturalistic figural style of Giotto, the famed Florentine painter, but also excelled at combining dazzling colors and stylized expressions for dramatic effect. The exaggerated facial features of Pietro da Rimini's figures ensured that their expressions would be comprehensible even when suspended high above the floor. In a recent innovation that demanded the worshiper's imagination, the open mouths of Mary and St. John suggest the sound of their lamentation.

Conservation

Date	Description	Narrative
12/31/1969	Examination	examined for condition
12/31/1969	Treatment	cleaned; other
1/06/1951	Treatment	cleaned; examined for condition; loss compensation; other; varnish removed or reduced
1/06/1951	Treatment	examined for condition; inpainted; other; varnish removed or reduced
1/06/1951	Treatment	examined for condition; other; varnish removed or reduced; x-ray
4/15/1987	Examination	examined for condition; other
5/01/1987	Treatment	inpainted; loss compensation; other
11/01/2001	Examination	examined for condition
11/13/2001	Treatment	examined for condition; other; surface cleaned; varnish removed or reduced
1/01/2002	Treatment	other
1/07/2003	Examination	cleaned; examined for condition; other; varnish removed or reduced

Provenance Don Marcello Massarenti Collection, Rome [date and mode of acquisition unknown] [1881 catalogue: no. 6, 7, and 8, as Cimabue; 1897 catalogue: no. 39, as Giotto]; Henry Walters, Baltimore, 1902, by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.

Credit Acquired by Henry Walters with the Massarenti Collection, 1902