Agony in the Garden (Bellini)
Giovanni Bellini · 15th century
The story
The Agony in the Garden is an early painting by the Italian Renaissance master Giovanni Bellini, who created it c. 1459–1465. It is a tempera painting on panel and is now in the National Gallery, London.
This work portrays the Agony in the Garden with Christ kneeling on the Mount of Olives in prayer, with his disciples Peter, James and John sleeping near to him. In the background, Judas leads the Roman soldiers to capture Christ.
The picture is closely related to the similar work by Bellini's brother-in-law, Andrea Mantegna, also in the National Gallery. It is likely that both derived from a drawing by Bellini's father, Jacopo. In Bellini's version, the treatment of dawn light has a more important role in giving the scene a quasi-unearthly atmosphere.
- Artist
- Giovanni Bellini
- Date
- 15th century
- Collection
- National Gallery, London, United Kingdom
- Movement
- Early Renaissance
- Medium
- tempera, panel
- Size
- 81 × 127 cm
Story adapted from the Wikipedia article and its contributors, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Facts from Wikidata (CC0). Image: Public domain, Wikimedia Commons.
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