Taking down fromcross - Lamentation over Christ

Mourning the body of Jesus, taken down from the cross, is a devotional motif conducive to contemplation in medieval art. The representations aim to appeal to the emotions, arouse sympathy and imitate the pain of loved ones mourning over the dead body of Christ, who suffered a cruel sacrifice. The immense relief with The Mourning scene is the third of the main paintings that once filled the central cupboard of the main altar in St Mary's Church in Wkryujście. It shows the most widespread variant of the representation in the late Middle Ages developed in Dutch art and connected with the development of the Eucharistic cult. The body of Christ laid on the shroud directly on the ground is mourned by His mother, John, Marie - His mother's sisters, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus. Many compositional motifs of the Wkryujście representation refer directly to the graphics of Hans Schäufelein, whose cycle of passion paintings was published in 1507 in Nuremberg. The German master's woodcut suggests what the composition of the relief was like, especially in the lower damaged part of the panel. Jesus' body is the compositional and ideological centre. Placed in the cloth of the shroud, it reminds us of the Eucharistic dimension of His sacrifice. Corpus Christi becomes a host, symbolising the mystery of the Eucharist. It refers to the transformation of bread into the flesh on the altar covered with the linen of the tablecloth. It testifies to the presence of Christ in the sacrament. The figure of fainting Mary in the foreground recalls the second theme of the representation, connected with the idea of compassio, Mary's participation in the suffering of her Son and the work of Salvation. The other figures, whose poses and facial expressions express deep sadness, are model models of late-medieval piety.

Kinga Krasnodębska