Luca Mombello: Mary Immaculata and God the Father (1560-1580)

(Pinacoteca Tosio Martinengo, Brescia, Italy)

A painting by the Italian artist Luca Mombello (1518/1520 – 1588/1596). A somewhat unusual painting which shows God the father and Mary in a garden. This garden is the garden of Eden with the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the background and the serpent at the front. Mary is presented here as the Virgin Mary who through the Immaculate Conception became pregnant of Jesus. As Adam and Eve were tempted by the serpent to taste the forbidden fruit from the tree of the knowledge, Mary ('the new Eve') is not tempted - she steps on the serpent. By the Immaculate Conception Mary is free from the ancestral sin (the sin of disobedience in consuming from the tree of knowledge of good and evil by Adam and Eve). Painting from 1560-1580.