Allegory of Charity
Francesco de Mura
1738–1744
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 139.5 × 134.6 cm (54 15/16 × 53 in.); Framed: 159.4 × 159.4 cm (62 3/4 × 62 3/4 in.)
- Genre
- oil on canvas
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago
Styles
Tags
oil paintings (visual works)paintingred (color)blue (color)paintcanvasarchitecturearchitechturewomanbabiesbluebloodoil on canvasbirdoil paint (paint)painting (image making)painting techniquesItaliansleepchildrenoil paintingwoman with childreneuropean painting18th Century
About
This painting presents an allegory of the virtue of charity through images of maternal love and sacrifice: a mother nurtures several young children and a pelican feeds her young by drawing blood from her own breast. This work was one of a set of allegories of five virtues intended as decorations set above doors in a palace belonging to the king of Savoy, a region in northwest Italy. Francesco de Mura spent most of his career in Naples but also worked for the king of Savoy in the 1740s, producing paintings in a style that combined grand, calm figures with active drapery. Although it is now rectangular, the canvas shows signs of an earlier curved shape appropriate to a Rococo room decoration.
