FRENCH SCHOOL OF THE XVIIth CENTURY The brazen serpent Terra - Lot 273

Lot n° 273
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Estimation :
2000 - 3000 EUR
FRENCH SCHOOL OF THE XVIIth CENTURY The brazen serpent Terra - Lot 273
FRENCH SCHOOL OF THE XVIIth CENTURY The brazen serpent Terracotta bas-relief Bearing an inscription in a cartouche in the lower part of the scene: Hunc Respiciens sanabituir Dim. 18 x 27 cm in an oval moulded wooden frame: Dim. 24 x 33,5 cm Taken from the book of Numbers (chap. 21), this bas-relief represents the episode of the brazen serpent. The people of Israel, having left the land of Egypt, walk in the desert, lose courage and protest against God who then sends "serpents with a burning bite" among them. Many died and the people begged Moses to intercede for them. God then said to Moses: "Make yourself a burning snake and set it up on a pole: all those who have been bitten, let them look at it, then they will live! ». The inscription in the centre of the scene indicates this way of salvation, while in the distance, on a promontory, stands the brazen serpent, the object of salvation. This terracotta is part of an iconography that spread widely in the 16th century and in which artists represented the bronze serpent as a prefiguration of the Cross. Emphasis is placed on the striking contrast between the foreground, where the Hebrew people are writhing in pain, and the background, the place of salvation magnified by the general organization of the composition, which unfolds like a jewel box for this symbol, no longer Jewish but Christian.
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