Crucifixion

Title: Crucifixion

Artist: Giotto di Bondone

Medium: Fresco

Size: 180 x 210 cm

Date: 1310s

Location: North transept, Lower Church, San Francesco, Assisi.

Mark 15:37-38 With a loud cry, Jesus breathed his last.

The curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.

The curtain of the temple separated the holiest part of the temple sanctuary from the rest of the sanctuary. This Holiest of Holies was understood to be the particular place of God’s presence. To say the curtain had been torn was to affirm that the execution of Jesus means that access to the presence of God is now open.

Giotto di Bondone (c. 1267 – January 8, 1337), better known simply as Giotto, was an Italian painter and architect from Florence in the late Middle Ages. He is generally considered the first in a line of great artists who contributed to the Italian Renaissance. In 1287, at the age of about 20, Giotto married Ricevuta di Lapo del Pela, known as "Ciuta". The couple had numerous children, (perhaps as many as eight) one of whom, Francesco, became a painter. From 1306 to 1311 Giotto was in Assisi, where he painted frescoes in the north transept area of the Lower Church, including The Life of Christ and various miracles by St Francis. The direct authorship of Giotto is debated, and many of these scenes were probably executed by Giotto's workshop under the direction of the master.