Descent from the Cross by Filippino Lippi and Pietro Perugino

Descent from the Cross by Filippino Lippi and Pietro Perugino (1503–07)

Taking down the body

Two ladders lean against the cross, and four men are lowering the dead Christ. At the top an old man with a white beard leans over the crossbar; on the right-hand ladder another man reaches across; a third, below, takes the weight of the body in his arms; and a fourth, standing on the ground, steadies the legs with a cloth. Long strips of linen hang from the arms of the cross and stream in the air. Christ's head falls to one side and his arms hang open.

On the ground, at the left, the Virgin has fainted and is held up by the women around her, a subject known as the Swoon of the Virgin. Mary Magdalene kneels at the foot of the cross in a red dress, her long hair down her back, looking up. On the right, Saint John stands with his hands open, as if in shock, or as if asking the men to lower the body gently. In front of him on the ground lie the nails.

Above and behind is a wide, pale sky, and low in the distance a calm landscape of hills and water. The panel is large, 346.5 by 240.5 centimetres with its frame, and painted in oil.

Two painters

The Servite friars of Santissima Annunziata in Florence commissioned the picture from Filippino Lippi for the high altar of their church. It was one side of a double-sided altarpiece: the other side, an Assumption of the Virgin, is still in the church, and the whole was completed by a series of smaller panels.

Filippino began at the top, with the figure of Christ, but died in 1504, soon after starting on the Magdalene. X-rays taken during the restoration of 1997 show that he meant her to embrace the cross. According to Vasari, Pietro Perugino then took over and finished the painting in 1507, together with the smaller panels. In Vasari's account Filippino painted the upper part, while Perugino completed the face of Christ and painted the lower part of the picture, with its calm faces and distant landscape. The Accademia's catalogue record gives the date as 1503–04.

Perugino worked with assistants from his well-organised workshop. Some scholars name Andrea d'Assisi among them, and possibly the young Raphael, who was in Florence around 1504. Those who see Raphael's hand find it in the Magdalene and in Saint John, which are of much higher quality than the group of women on the left.

A cool reception

Florentines criticised Perugino's work on the altarpiece for its lack of new invention. Vasari reports his reply: he had painted the same figures they had praised before, and if they no longer pleased them, what could he do? The altarpiece was his last work in Florence.

It was dismantled in 1654 and its panels were dispersed; several are now in museums in Germany, New York, Rome and Chicago. The Descent from the Cross passed into the Grand Duke's collections and came to the Galleria dell'Accademia in 1954. Because it was in poor condition and too large to move easily, it was restored in the gallery itself in 1997.

About this print

Made from a photograph of the painting, a tall panel with the cross at its centre and the Virgin and saints gathered at the foot.

Sources: Galleria dell'Accademia, Florence, inv. 1890 no. 8370 · Wikipedia, "Annunziata Polyptych", "Filippino Lippi", "Pietro Perugino" · Web Gallery of Art · Wikimedia Commons · Perugino 2023