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The Purification of the Temple

Image credit: The National Gallery, London

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Christ arrives at the temple to find it full of money-changers and traders. Christ says, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves. And the blind and the lame came to him in the temple; and he healed them’ (Matthew 21: 12–15). Jacopo Bassano has depicted both parts of the story. Christ first appears lashing a whip to clear the crowd and livestock. He appears again in the background healing people. The money-changer grasping his carpet-covered table has often been thought to be a portrait of the painter Titian. If so, it would suggest that Bassano was making a cutting comment about the senior artist’s love of money. The subject of the Purification of the Temple was rare in Italy at that time but Bassano returned to it many times.

The National Gallery, London

London

Title

The Purification of the Temple

Date

probably about 1580

Medium

Oil on canvas

Measurements

H 160.5 x W 267.5 cm

Accession number

NG228

Acquisition method

Presented by Philip L. Hinds, 1853

Work type

Painting

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Normally on display at

The National Gallery, London

Trafalgar Square, London, Greater London WC2N 5DN England

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