Matthias Grunewald- Reshma Ramachandran

The piece above is entitled the The Mocking of Christ (1503) and was made by a Germanic artist named Matthias Grunewald. This piece is a prime example of the deviation between the Northern and Italian/Southern European Renaissance in which the Northern Renaissance tend to concentrate more on religious aspects in their pieces while ignoring the classicism and staying true to the central medieval methods of painting/drawing. In this piece, we see Christ blindfolded and being dragged along while spectators look on as surrounding people harass him. The tone of the piece is quite dark as highlighted by the darker colors in the background as compared to the foreground. The lighting is this painting is quite vivid and differs as your eye moves across the painting. Additionally, the creation of perspective is made through color and size of the objects. In the foreground, we see the people have brighter hues whereas in the back the figures are smaller and blend easily with the dark background.