The anonymous carving of the Nativity of Jesus that is found in the Moravian Gallery in Brno (Czech: Moravská galerie v Brně) dates from around 1520 and is sculpted from linden wood. According to the museum sign, it’s from Southern Bohemia or Lower Austria. It’s a busy image:
To the left, Joseph enters from an arched doorway, while the ox and ass peak in. The woven basket is an interesting detail, and Joseph’s beard has a more exaggerated set of curlicues compared with the torso of Christ dating from around 1500. Clearly, there’s a style.
Mary is observing as a group of children appear to have Christ in a blanket – reminds me of the childhood game with a parachute, but with a baby, not a ball. There might be some safety concerns here.
Standing up behind is the hillside, with flocks, while we peak into a scene with a cradle on one level and a store-room on another. I’m not sure what the round basket-like object is, or the bags (?) on top of it; to my eye the thing on top looks like a lap desk, but then, I like a good lap desk.
In other words, it is a scene of abundance.
Joseph’s square bib with its edging seems very 16th century to my eye, while the keffiyeh (square headcloth) with brown agal (the rope to hold it in place) is the one gesture to the middle eastern origins that came to my attention
The oversized baby comes with oversized hair for a newborn, but the gestures of the “support staff” that tend to him are visually more interesting. The one at the bottom right is particularly interesting, the turn of her shoulder showing the work she is putting in, and the sweep of the skirt contrasting with the horizontal band of her blouse. I’m pretty sure those are wings on the worker who faces her, the angelic and the human working together in the story.
The flocks deserve a close look, along with the hilltop habitations; the middle one with its miniature walls suggest that all was not always peaceful in these imagined times.
And then there’s the Mary, not, evidently, in “Virgin Mary Blue” but rather a acreamy color. She’s still got the nicely decorated collar line and flowing fabric. Her hair is loose and very, very long – down to her calves, at a minimum
Her chin has a bit of a dimple, and she has the high forehead that was a signal of beauty:
Her headband is more ornate than Joseph’s, a twisting comination of patterned and smoothed side replicated by the sculptor. And, we can see that her hair was likely blond, with all that yellow tinting surviving to the present day.
In short, lots to look at. There’s no single focal point here; instead, everything participates in the story. That shared participation is what gives the carving its warmth. It leaves you with the sense that holiness and humanness are woven together in every inch of the scene.
OTHER BRNO MORAVIAN GALLERY ARTWORKS:
