Adam and Eve in the Garden with a Pair of Sheep and a Pair of Doves Possibly 1780

This image shows Adam and Eve in the Garden with a Pair of Sheep and a Pair of Doves. It's an anonymous work of art, rendered in ink and watercolor on parchment. This piece invites us to consider the public role of art in medieval society. Religious narratives were central to cultural understanding and social order. The image’s visual codes – the figures of Adam and Eve, the symbolic animals – would have been immediately recognizable, reinforcing established religious teachings about creation, innocence, and the natural world. The absence of a known artist is notable. It suggests a context where the creation of art was perhaps more communal or tied to religious institutions rather than individual expression. The parchment support speaks to the economic structures of the time, where access to materials was often determined by social class and institutional affiliation. By researching religious and social histories, as well as the economics of artistic production, we gain insight into the meanings art held at the time.