Rest on the Flight into Egypt

Mola painted this small scene on copper in the early 1640s, years before he settled in Rome and made his name. The subject is the Holy Family fleeing Herod into Egypt, but there is nothing fearful about it. Mary leans over to lift the infant Jesus, old Joseph rests in the shade, and fruit is spread around them like a country picnic on a warm afternoon. In the background an angel walks a donkey down to drink from a spring, in the old apocryphal story the water that the child Jesus had just called out of the ground. The copper support gives the paint a smooth, enamel-like glow that suits the calm. Scholars count six paintings of this theme across Mola's career, and this is thought to be the earliest of them.