# The Repentant Magdalen [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [LA TOUR, Georges de]() - Date: 1601-1650 - Technique: Oil on canvas, 113 x 93 cm ## Commentary The repentant \(penitent\) Magdalen was a theme of particular importance for Georges de La Tour. He is known to have painted four full-length versions of the subject which are now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; in the Musée du Louvre, Paris; in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles; and in the National Gallery of Art, Washington. Moreover, there are several copies as well as a contemporary engraving. All of La Tour's Magdalens run counter to the type favoured by most of his contemporaries, who preferred to portray a voluptuous and scantily clothed Magdalen in a cave or grotto, eyes heavenward, curly blond hair flowing over her shoulders. By contrast, La Tour's Magdalens appear in profile with dark, straight hair, seated at a table in an austere interior. ## Related artworks - [Adoration of the Shepherds]() - [Blind Musician]() - [Cheater with the Ace of Diamonds]() - [Christ in the Carpenter's Shop \(detail\)]() - [Christ in the Carpenter's Shop]() - [Fortune Teller]() - [Job Mocked by his Wife]() - [Magdalen of Night Light]() - [Magdalen with the Smoking Flame]() - [Peasant Couple Eating]() - [Penitent St Jerome]() - [Saint Jerome Reading]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()