Maria met handen voor de borst gekruist 1632 - 1693

Editor: Here we have "Maria met handen voor de borst gekruist," made sometime between 1632 and 1693 by François de Poilly. It's an engraving. It really conveys a sense of pious devotion with Mary looking upward and the stark lighting on her face. What can you tell me about the cultural weight of this piece? Curator: Look at how her hands are posed - crossed over her chest. What feeling does that gesture evoke for you? Does it carry a familiar symbolic weight? Editor: It makes me think of supplication or mourning, the kind of sorrowful gesture you see a lot in religious art. Curator: Exactly. The placement of hands upon the breast is an ancient signifier of grief, humility, and piety. Consider the Baroque period in which de Poilly created this engraving. It was a time marked by both religious fervor and great upheaval. Does that inform your view of this portrait? Editor: Definitely, seeing that religious symbolism within the specific cultural context of the Baroque period makes it even more powerful. It is like the artist and the subject in the art create a mirror to each other in their own eras of their own feelings. Curator: Precisely. Images like this helped to reinforce religious feeling in a period of great uncertainty. Editor: So it becomes not just art, but a cultural touchstone that tells a specific story. Curator: In a way, yes, each symbol and its historical use, they carry cultural memory, informing each work's deeper layers. It makes us more reflective on the emotional charge in religious visual arts. Editor: I never thought about symbols as having so much potential layered meaning. Curator: It is their connection through ages. The past echoes in the present!