906. THE MADONNA IN ECSTASY.
Carlo Crivelli (Venetian: painted 1468-1493). See 602.
The latest of Crivelli's dated pictures in the Gallery (1492), and remarkable for the deep colours which mark the artist's highest powers. Notice the usual hanging fruit and the pot of roses and carnations. The Virgin looks up to the Almighty and the dove, while two angels, with a scroll, support a crown over her head. On the scroll are inscribed (in Latin) the words, "As I was conceived in the mind of God from the beginning, so was I also made."
The masterpiece known as "The Virgin in Ecstasy," rather presents (as the text shows) the idea which is the foundation of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, combined with the "Coronation" of the glorified mother. It is intended, in fact, to bring before us not the historical mother of Christ so much as that mediæval conception of the mystical being of Ecclesiasticus and the Book of Wisdom, existing from all time in the mind of God as the instrument of the Incarnation, and returning to share the glory of her divine Son. Crivelli has expressed with rare distinction that combination of humility and awe with a sense of personal dignity which befits this ideal of the Virgin. In herself she is an imposing figure, but she is absorbed in the divine influences which mould her destiny. Never did Crivelli come nearer to the grand style than in this magnificent conception (Rushforth's Crivelli, p. 75).