The Assumption of the Virgin

"To me the effect is like music."

TITIAN, 1477-1576. ACADEMY OF FINE ARTS, VENICE.

Of all the themes in sacred art, not one is more complete or beautiful in what it represents and suggests than "The Assumption." Earth and its sorrows, death and the grave, are left below, and the pure spirit of the Virgin Mother, attended by angelic hosts, soars upward to meet her Divine Son, and to be reunited with Him forever.

The old painters distinguish between the assumption of the soul, and the assumption of the body, of the Virgin; in the first, Christ is present to receive the soul the moment it is separated from the body; in the second, the soul is reunited with the body, and we have the bodily ascension of the Virgin to the Father, who is generally represented as coming forth from the vault of heaven to receive her, attended by cherubim bearing her crown. The legend concerning the death and assumption of the Virgin, affords artists several distinct subjects: 1. The angel bearing a palm of victory and announcing to Mary her approaching death. 2. Her taking leave of the Apostles.3. Her death, or transit, as Romanists call it, with the Apostles and the Marys present. 4. The Apostles bearing her to the sepulchre, St. John sorrowing most of all for the loss of his adopted mother. 5. Her entombment. 6. Her assumption. 7. Her coronation in Heaven, where she takes her place beside her Son. The separate subjects are sometimes combined, as above the doors of Notre Dame, in Paris. The Assumption, Like the Nativity, has been a favorite theme. Rubens painted twelve different Assumptions; but the one in the Academy of Fine Arts in Venice, by Titian, has a world-wide reputation. It was ordered for the high altar of Santa Maria di Frari, Venice, and when, after two years of elaboration, it was raised to its position, the church was filled with an admiring throng.

Titian evidently had regard to its elevated position, as is apparent in its proportions, and he intended to carry the eye of the beholder up from the earthly tomb, surrounded by the Apostles, first to the figure of the Madonna in mid-air, supported by clouds, and borne upward by the multitude of the heavenly host; then higher still to the figure of the Almighty Father, attended by cherubim, ready to welcome and crown her.

As the Church had never decided in what manner the Virgin was translated, only pronouncing it heresy to doubt the fact, the whole field of imagination was left open to the artist. However, the open coffin below, and the opening of the heavens above, became fixed by the traditions of art.

In "the Assumption" of Titian, we see all the accessories, and yet an evident attempt to depart from the old traditions. The noble figure of the Virgin, in a flood of golden light, is being so swiftly impelled upward that her veil and drapery are disturbed by the rapid motion. Her feet are uncovered, which was not admissible in ancient art. Her drapery, instead of being white, is of the usual blue and crimson, the very same colors of her clothing in life.

Her face is not youthful, but sublime and powerful in its expression of rapture. Fascinating groups of angels surround her, while beneath are the grand Apostles looking up, and betraying their emotion by their solemn gestures. Over all is the inimitable coloring of Titian, which, Mrs. Jameson says, renders the picture an enchantment. She adds: "To me the effect is like music." In Art, the term "Assumption" refers to the bodily ascension of the Virgin Mary, while the "Ascension" refers strictly to Christ.

One legendary account of the Virgin's death tells us, that she expired while all the Apostles had gone forth to preach. Each of them, however, felt an impulse that brought him to her home. All arrived at the same moment. Finding her already laid in the grave, they went thither. Opening her coffin, they beheld it empty, or rather filled with forget-me-nots. She was not there, but risen. Looking upward, they saw her soaring heavenward; this scene of divinest rapture seems to be the supreme moment which Titian has immortalized.