The Risen Christ Appearing to Mary Magdalene

The Gospel of John says that when Mary Magdalene found the tomb empty and a man standing nearby, she took him for the gardener, until he spoke her name and she knew him. Most painters hurry past that mistake and show a radiant Christ. Rembrandt, in 1638, built the whole picture on it. His risen Christ wears a broad sun hat and holds a spade, dressed exactly as the gardener she had assumed him to be, caught in the pale first light before dawn. Mary half-rises from the tomb, still uncertain. Rembrandt was about 32 and running a busy Amsterdam studio, and he was drawn to these quiet hinge-moments, the second before recognition. George IV bought the small picture in 1819, and it has stayed in the Royal Collection since.