03 — ARTWORK
Judith
- MEDIUM
- Tempera on wood, 31 x 18 cm
- TYPE
- Religious
PALETTE
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CURRENT LOCATION · National Gallery of Art
- FILE
- 900 × 1502 px · JPEG
COMMENTARY
UNDERLINED TERMS ARE DEFINED IN THE GLOSSARY.
Once owned by King Charles I of England, this painting illustrates an episode from the Old Testament which relates how the Israelite Judith by guile killed the Assyrian general Holofernes and thus saved her beleaguered city. Painted with minute detail, Judith and her handmaiden finish their deed with tragic calm.
Among Mantegna's works there are several representations of Judith that, without exception, show a comparatively peaceful scene in which Judith is placing the severed head of Holofernes in a bag. During the BaroqueThe period in art history from about 1600 to about 1750. In this sense the term covers a wide range of styles and artists. In painting and sculpture there were three main forms of Baroque: (1) sumptuous display, a style associated with the Catholic Counter Reformation and the absolutist courts of Europe (Bernini, Rubens); (2) dramatic realism (Caravaggio); and (3) everyday realism, a development seen in particular in Holland (Rembrandt, Vermeer). In architecture, there was an emphasis on expressiveness and grandeur, achieved through scale, the dramatic use of light and shadow, and increasingly elaborate decoration. In a more limited sense the term Baroque often refers to the first of these categories. The development of the Baroque reflects the period's religious tensions (Catholic versus Protestant); a new and more expansive world view based on science and exploration; and the growth of absolutist monarchies., in contrast, the dramatic central moment of the action was preferred, as Judith, often with great effort, <a onclick="return OpenOther('/html/g/gentiles/artemisi/judit.html')" href="/html/g/gentiles/artemisi/judit.html">decapitates Holofernes.</a> <p> <table align=left cellpadding=5 border=1 width=320 bgcolor="#99cccc"> <tr valign=middle><td><img src="/support/gif/listen.gif" border=0 valign=middle> Suggested listening (streaming mp3, 17 minutes):<br><a href="#" onClick="w=window.open ('/music1/17_cent/scarlatti_giuditta.html', 'newWin', 'scrollbars=yes,status=no,dependent=yes,screenX=0,screenY=0,width=350,height=350');w.opener=this;w.focus();return true"><b>Alessandro Scarlatti: La Giuditta, oratorio, Part I (excerpts)</b></a> </td></tr></table>
OTHER WORKS BY ANDREA MANTEGNA
CITE THIS RECORD — BIBTEX
@online{wga-r9647ca9c44b86c,
author = {Krén, Emil and Marx, Daniel},
title = {Judith by MANTEGNA, Andrea},
organization = {{Web Gallery of Art}},
date = {2026-09-13},
url = {https://beta.wga.hu/artists/mantegna-andrea-r671bf8b11d2a72/judith-r9647ca9c44b86c},
urldate = {2026-09-13},
langid = {english}
}ACCESSED 2026-09-13. REPLACE THE AUTHOR FIELD WITH THE COMMENTARY AUTHOR WHERE ONE IS NAMED.