L'Homme de douleurs

This small panel was made in the Low Countries around 1490, in the world of the Devotio Moderna, a lay religious movement there that urged ordinary people to meditate privately and intently on Christ's suffering. It is painted for exactly that kind of close, personal prayer. Christ stands in his own tomb, still crowned with thorns, pressing a hand to the wound in his side and looking straight out at you. Around him small angels hold the instruments of the Passion, the nails, the whip, the cross. Mary and Mary Magdalene weep at the front. Geertgen tot Sint Jans died young, in his late twenties, and only a handful of his paintings survive.