Assumption of the Virgin Mary

From the tomb to the open sky

Mary rises through the centre of Peter Paul Rubens's Assumption of the Virgin Mary. At the bottom, people gather around a tomb. Some peer inside while others look or reach upward. Above them, angels carry the movement into bright sky. Mary is neither standing on the ground nor seated in heaven; Rubens places her in passage between the two. The painting asks a viewer to follow that ascent from the crowded lower half to the light around her face and clothing.

This is the monumental painting on the high altar of the Cathedral of Our Lady in Antwerp. The cathedral dates it to 1625–26^[1] and lists it as oil on panel, 490 × 325 centimetres. The structured specifications matter because the French descriptive paragraph loosely uses a word for canvas, while the cathedral's material field identifies panel. Nearly five metres tall, the work was made for a setting where viewers would look toward it from the church below, not for the scale of a domestic room.

The picture's two levels are strongly contrasted but visually connected. At the tomb, heads and shoulders overlap in earthier shadows. A woman in pale pink kneels toward the foreground, while a figure at the left throws an arm toward the sky. Mary's white, blue and rose-coloured drapery catches far more light. Angels around her repeat the upward pull begun by the figures below. The eye can travel through the painting without a hard division between a human gathering and the heavenly event.

At a Glance

• ArtistPeter Paul Rubens ^[1]
• Date1625–26 ^[1]
• MediumOil on panel ^[1]
• Dimensions490 × 325 cm ^[1]
• LocationHigh altar, Cathedral of Our Lady, Antwerp ^[1]

Where this work sits in Rubens's career

Rubens's career

16001610162016301640

The Elevation of the Cross

1609–10

The Descent from the Cross

1611–14

The Assumption of the Virgin Mary

1625–26

The Garden of Love

1630–35

The Three Graces

1630–35

Contents

1. What does the Assumption mean?
2. Following the movement through the panel
3. How was the high-altar painting made?
4. The first altar proposal and the later commission
5. The design beyond Antwerp
6. Is Isabella Brant among the figures?

What does the Assumption mean?

The Assumption is the Christian belief that Mary was taken into heavenly glory. The Antwerp church heritage account^[2] is clear that this scene is not a direct narrative episode in the Bible. It connects the tradition to later Christian writing and distinguishes it from a verse that simply describes Mary rising from a tomb. The cathedral's interpretation^[1] uses Revelation 2:10, with its promise of a crown of life, as a theological parallel. That verse is not a documentary description of the figures Rubens painted.

In Rubens's scene, the empty tomb and the onlookers make Mary's bodily absence visible below, while her ascending figure is visible above. Some at the tomb still study what remains there; others have begun to look toward her. Those different responses help the viewer understand an event that cannot be represented as ordinary travel through space. Rubens gives it a physical movement of bodies, cloth and light, yet the movement also carries a devotional meaning.

The cathedral is dedicated to Our Lady, so Mary was an especially fitting subject for its high altar. The painting would have been encountered during worship, surrounded by architecture and, originally, a larger sculptural altar. Its theme offered a hopeful vision of life with God to the congregation, as the cathedral explains. That reading belongs to the work's religious setting. It need not be turned into a claim that every single gesture has one fixed allegorical label.

There was also a history behind the vacant place Rubens was asked to fill. Antwerp church heritage^[2] says a high-altar triptych by Frans Floris, made in 1560, had not survived the period of Calvinist rule. A different Floris painting, The Adoration of the Shepherds of 1568, served temporarily after Catholic worship was restored. The chapter's first attempt to replace that provisional picture began in 1611 but did not produce the permanent cathedral altarpiece. The later Rubens commission therefore answered a long-standing need at the most prominent altar in the church; its delay was part of a larger sequence of decisions about what should occupy that space.

Following the movement through the panel

The Antwerp heritage description^[2] identifies the outstretched figure at the far left as John and reads his arm as a bridge from the people at the tomb toward Mary. Another path starts with the kneeling woman in pink, moves through the yellow cloak of an apostle, follows raised hands and then joins the angels on the right. These are the heritage account's close-looking paths through the work, not a surviving diagram drawn by Rubens. They do explain why the lower group does more than form a static base under Mary.

At the tomb, faces turn in several directions. One person looks into it, another watches the ascent, and another seems caught between the two. Above, angels form a loose circle around Mary. Their bodies bend and turn around her rather than lining up in a straight ladder. The effect is motion that expands as it rises. A small reproduction cannot convey the physical size of the panel, but the contrasting groups and the broad current of light remain legible.

The Antwerp heritage account^[2] follows one version of the legend in which apostles arrive at Mary's tomb with several women and find only the shroud. It identifies Peter still looking inside, John reaching up at the left, and Paul present while Thomas remains away. These are readings of the painted group through a later Christian narrative, not names inscribed beside every face. The more important visual point is that the group does not react with one mind. Some attend to evidence in the empty tomb; others respond to Mary above. Their mixed directions invite a viewer to discover the ascent gradually, as the figures do.

Colour makes that current easier to follow. Deep red, yellow and blue appear in the human group and return in Mary's clothing and the surrounding sky. White cloth flashes near the upper centre. The heritage account notes how pale pink joins the woman below to passages in Mary's outer garment. Those repeated colours link earth and heaven just as arms and glances do. Rubens does not need a painted architectural border between the two realms; the figures and their light establish the transition.

How was the high-altar painting made?

The Antwerp church heritage research^[2] records a longer development than the concise 1625–26 catalogue date suggests. The cathedral chapter considered different designs, including a Coronation of Mary by Rubens's former teacher Otto van Veen. Rubens also made proposals. His painting's costs were covered by the dean Johannes del Rio under an arrangement connected with a promised burial place in the cathedral. Del Rio died before he could see the finished panel.

According to that heritage account, Rubens began the large painting in 1625 and worked to fit it to the altar architecture in 1626. When the panel was tried in the choir, it proved too narrow for its intended frame; a strip about 20 centimetres wide was added at the right. The account places completion at the end of 1626 or possibly early 1627. The cathedral's simpler 1625–26 date remains a useful main range, while the installation history explains why a source may refer to finishing work shortly afterward. This is a specific practical adjustment to the Antwerp panel, not a general formula for Rubens's altarpieces.

The fit was not the only feature of the building reconsidered for the new picture. Antwerp church heritage also records that the chapter moved a medieval stained-glass window with a conspicuous lemon-yellow field two bays along the south side of the choir to improve light falling on the painting. The adjustment shows that viewers' ability to see the colours was part of the altar project. It makes the finished panel a negotiated element of an architectural space rather than a portable image that happened to be hung there afterward. The record suggests a concern Rubens may have shared, but does not prove which person first proposed moving the window.

The Mauritshuis's account of a surviving oil sketch^[3] supplies a firm contractual milestone: Rubens and Johannes del Rio signed an agreement on 12 November 1619 for a picture of either Mary's Assumption or her Coronation, at 1,500 guilders. This was several years before the monumental panel took its final form. The long interval had a practical reason. The high altar, made by Robrecht and Jan de Nolde, was not ready until spring 1626. A concise date under the finished painting can hide that prolonged negotiation between image and architectural setting.

The transcribed contract and Rubens's own receipts^[7] make the agreement more precise than its price alone suggests. Rubens undertook to paint the history of Mary's Assumption or Coronation to the chapter's satisfaction and to the best of his ability. The proposed panel was to be roughly sixteen feet high, with its width governed by the requirements of the new altar, and the agreed 1,500 guilders included appropriately decorated inner framing insofar as it was Rubens's work. The contract did not fix the exact final composition or the finished panel's width. That helps explain why a design study and an adjustment at installation could belong to the same commission rather than contradict its written terms.

The Mauritshuis's modello, inventory 926, is a separate oil-on-panel study made about 1622–25. At 87.8 × 59.1 centimetres, it is much smaller than the cathedral picture. The museum describes it as a way to show the client a proposed composition while changes were still possible. Its quick brushwork gives the ascent a visible swirl from the sarcophagus through the surrounding angels. The study is neither the finished altar painting nor an earlier Assumption made for another church; its secure role is preparation for this Antwerp high altar.

The first altar proposal and the later commission

The 1619 contract was not Rubens's first contact with the cathedral chapter about Mary's ascent. In a 2024 Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage study^[5], Jean-Pierre De Bruyn reviews two designs submitted in April 1611 for an earlier high-altar proposal. A Hermitage study combining Mary's Assumption and Coronation is one of the works discussed. De Bruyn connects that campaign to a large Assumption panel now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, measuring about 458 × 297 centimetres. That Vienna painting later served the Jesuit church in Antwerp and is a distinct work from the 490 × 325 centimetre panel on the cathedral altar today. The existence of an earlier design campaign explains why “Rubens's Assumption for Antwerp” can be an ambiguous phrase unless the object and place are named.

The records make that earlier competition more concrete. De Bruyn cites the cathedral chapter's 24 March 1611 record of a proposal by Otto van Veen, Rubens's former teacher, for a scene of Mary invited to her coronation. On 22 April, two Rubens designs for the Assumption were presented and the chapter found them acceptable, while reserving its choice of painter. The later history does not show the Vienna panel being installed on this high altar. De Bruyn considers several explanations, including a possible problem with its size, but he leaves the reason unsettled. The documented submissions and the unknown fate of the proposed altar picture should remain distinct: neither a failed commission nor the exact reason for its failure can be read straight from the cathedral's current panel.

The precise family tree of those earlier designs is still a scholarly question. De Bruyn proposes that an oil sketch in a private Antwerp collection was the second 1611 modello and compares its angels and Mary's raised palm with other versions. He also notes that an associated drawing in Vienna has been attributed differently by scholars. These proposals are evidence of ongoing reconstruction, not a reason to reclassify the holding Mauritshuis's later modello or the present cathedral panel. The page's image and main chronology concern the cathedral picture made under the 1619 agreement. The 1611 material belongs to the background of repeated attempts to settle an altar design.

There was a further step before the signed agreement: De Bruyn dates the chapter's second commission to 16 February 1618, with two designs again under consideration. The November 1619 contract then fixed Rubens's obligation to del Rio and the fee, while still allowing either Assumption or Coronation as the subject. These dates describe related decisions, not competing dates for the same document. Nor should all the earlier images be arranged as a straightforward line leading to the 1625–26 panel. De Bruyn discusses whether the designs of 1611 were reused in the later round and finds that link uncertain. The Mauritshuis sketch belongs securely to the later cathedral project; the private sketch's proposed 1611 role remains his reconstruction.

De Bruyn reports an exact later milestone for the final cathedral picture: a last payment to Rubens on 10 March 1627. That date supports the possibility of work or settlement extending beyond the cathedral's compact 1625–26 label. It does not mean every part of the panel was painted in March 1627; the documented installation in May 1626 and adjustments to its width had already occurred. Reading the dates as a sequence—agreement, preparation, installation, alteration and final payment—makes better sense of the object's making than choosing one year and discarding the rest.

The published transcription of Rubens's handwritten receipts^[7] shows how that fee was settled: he acknowledged 1,000 guilders on 30 September 1626 and a further 500 guilders on 10 March 1627, the latter as full satisfaction of the contract. A later account in the same article also records 45 guilders for ultramarine used in Mary's dress and an apostle's clothing, paid by del Rio's heirs. That colour payment is reported by the art historian, while the two dated instalments are visible in the transcribed receipt itself. Together they provide unusually concrete evidence of the cost of a major blue pigment, but they do not tell us exactly where on the painted surface each portion of it was laid.

The Mauritshuis account also connects the upward design to something a present-day photograph cannot fully recover. The seventeenth-century altar rose about fourteen metres and included a sculpted Christ holding Mary's crown, with God the Father above. Mary's movement in the painted panel therefore led toward a destination outside the rectangular image. Seen without that sculptural top, the painting can look as though its ascent simply continues into sky. In its first setting, the architecture completed the route. This makes the current picture and the lost altar parts of one historical visual programme, while keeping the surviving panel distinct from the vanished structure.

The arrangement linked more than the three principal figures. Antwerp's account of the altar^[2] describes sculpted angels on either side of the crown, carrying palms and wreaths that repeated the gestures of angels in the upper part of Rubens's panel. It also records God the Father blessing from the broken pediment, with a dove representing the Holy Spirit, and tall candlesticks relating the heavenly scene to worship at the altar below. These elements gave the movement a sequence: human witnesses at the tomb, Mary rising through the painting, and a sculpted heavenly reception above. A crop of the painting alone cannot show the full route that the original ensemble made visible.

There is visual evidence for that lost arrangement. Antwerp church heritage^[2] points to a 1631 etching by Adriaan Lommelin that records the Baroque altar. The print shows why the sculpture was integral to a viewer's understanding: the rising Virgin in Rubens's panel was met above by a gilded Christ offering a crown, with God the Father higher still. The etched view is a record of an ensemble, not a replica of the painting's colours or a guarantee that every visitor saw the altar from the same angle. It does, however, recover the upward sequence that disappears when the panel is isolated in a modern photograph.

On 11 May 1626, the Mauritshuis says porters were paid for installing the great panel, and Rubens continued work on it in place. The Antwerp heritage account records that he had begun the painting in his workshop the previous summer, so the installation was a stage in its making, not its first brushstroke. The Mauritshuis places this work during an Antwerp plague outbreak and records Isabella Brant's death on 20 June 1626. Those dates help locate the making of the picture amid Rubens's life. They do not prove that the red-clad woman at the tomb is Isabella, or that a particular facial expression is a private memorial. The documentary chronology and the older proposed likeness are different kinds of evidence.

The altar itself continued to change. The original Baroque setting joined the painting to sculptural figures above it, including a crowned reception for Mary. The heritage account says the original altar was sold in 1798 during the French Revolutionary period; after Rubens's panel returned from Paris, a new high altar was designed. The present setting therefore does not reproduce every part of the seventeenth-century ensemble. The painting remains in the cathedral and still occupies the high-altar position for which the commission was developed.

The later altar was not an attempt to erase the subject. According to Antwerp church heritage^[2], the church council asked city architect Jan Blom in 1817 for a replacement faithful to the earlier Baroque and thematic idea. A group of plastered wooden figures by Jan Frans van Geel, dated 1826, again places Christ and God the Father in the act of offering Mary a crown. The material and maker of that sculpted crown scene are nineteenth-century, while the Rubens panel is seventeenth-century. Keeping those layers separate helps a visitor understand why the altar today can still express Mary's reception in heaven without being Rubens's original setting.

The design beyond Antwerp

The Antwerp panel is one member of a broader family of related images, and the relationship is useful for understanding Rubens's choices. The National Gallery of Art in Washington^[4] holds a smaller panel it catalogues as an anonymous or workshop replica based closely on the Mauritshuis oil sketch. The Washington painting is not a reduction of the completed high altar: its arched source design was expanded into a rectangle, leaving upper corners that the museum regards as less fully resolved. The NGA distinguishes the copy's execution from Rubens's quicker modello. Calling that Washington work the cathedral original, or calling it an autograph second high altar, would collapse different objects and stages of the design.

A conservation study of the Washington panel^[6] follows its paint layers, underdrawing and added margins. It argues for a close dependence on the Mauritshuis study rather than on the later engraving by Schelte à Bolswert. That technical argument concerns the Washington replica. It can tell us how the cathedral design circulated through the workshop, but its measurements and painted revisions cannot be transferred to the monumental Antwerp panel. The same study gives a somewhat later account of final cathedral completion than the church's public dating, which is another reason to preserve the chronology in the site-specific Antwerp records rather than force a single year from every secondary discussion.

Is Isabella Brant among the figures?

An old story identifies the woman in striking red near Mary's tomb as Isabella Brant, Rubens's first wife, who died in 1626. The Antwerp heritage study^[2] traces that suggestion to the eighteenth century and tests its visual basis. It finds the proposed likeness uncertain: several heads changed between design and finished painting, and viewers have also claimed to recognise Isabella in Mary herself. The differing identifications show how easily resemblance can be made to fit a compelling story.

It is reasonable to notice the red-clad figure and to ask whether personal loss affected Rubens's work. It is not reasonable to name her as a documented portrait of Isabella. No secure sitter record is offered by the sources reviewed here. The figure's first task in the image is to join the human response around the tomb. Her colour and placement help the eye move through the scene whether or not any personal allusion was intended.

Rubens artworks directory

128 artworks

Search artworks Medium All media Drawing Painting Reset

Name	Date	Medium
A Seated Lion / Study of a Seated Lion	Circa 1612–1613	Drawing
Adam and Eve	1598–1600	Painting
Albert Rubens in Profile to the Left	Circa 1619	Drawing
Allegory of Emperor Charles V as Ruler of the World	Circa 1604	Painting
An Autumn Landscape with a View of Het Steen in the Early Morning	Probably 1636	Painting
Atalanta and Meleager Hunting the Calydonian Boar	1635–1640	Painting
Bildnis einer Frau / Portrait of a Woman (traditionally identified as Isabella Brant)		Painting
Christ on the Cross / Christus aan het kruis (oil modello)	1628	Painting
Cows, Study for a Painting		Drawing
Daniel in the Lions' Den	Circa 1614–1616	Painting
Das Opfer Abrahams / The Sacrifice of Abraham (drawing after Titian)		Drawing
Der Triumph des Siegers / The Triumph of Victory	Circa 1614	Painting
Diana and Callisto	Circa 1635	Painting
Don Diego Messía (Mexía) Felipe de Guzmán, Marquis of Leganés		Drawing
Epitaph of Nicolaas Rockox and His Wife Adriana Perez (traditionally The Incredulity of Thomas)	1613–1615	Painting
Equestrian Portrait of Giovan Carlo Doria / Ritratto di Giovan Carlo Doria a cavallo	1607–1608	Painting
Equestrian Portrait of the Duke of Lerma	1603	Painting
Ex-voto: Virgin and Child with portraits of the donors Alexandre Goubau and Anna Anthony		Painting
Ganymede / Ganymed	1611–1612	Painting
Georges Villiers, Herzog von Buckingham / George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham		Drawing
Gesatteltes Pferd / Saddled Horse	Circa 1615–1618	Drawing
Head of a Woman with Downcast Eyes (study for the Madonna of the Ildefonso Altarpiece)		Drawing
I quattro filosofi / The Four Philosophers	Circa 1611–1612	Painting
Ignudo Turning to the Right (after Michelangelo)	Circa 1606	Drawing
Juno and Argus	Circa 1610	Painting
La Marche de Silène / The Procession of Silenus		Drawing
Lamentation over the Dead Christ / Compianto su Cristo morto	1601–1602	Painting
Landscape with Philemon and Baucis		Painting
Landscape with St George and the Dragon	1630–1635	Painting
Landscape with the Ruins of the Palatine Hill in Rome / Paysage avec les ruines du mont Palatin à Rome	Circa 1614–1618	Painting
Leda and the Swan (Stephen Mazoh collection version)	Before 1600	Painting
Les Pèlerins d'Emmaüs / The Supper at Emmaus (Saint-Eustache version)	Circa 1608–1611	Painting
Madonna della Vallicella Adored by Angels / Madonna con Bambino e angeli	1606–1608	Painting
Madonna in a Garland of Flowers / Madonna im Blumenkranz	Circa 1616–1618	Painting
Madonna Surrounded by Saints / Madonna met heiligen	Circa 1630	Painting
Marchesa Brigida Spinola Doria	1606	Painting
Marchesa Maria Serra Pallavicino (?)	1606	Painting
Marie de Medici, Queen of France	Circa 1622	Painting
Mercury and Argus / Merkur und Argus	Circa 1635–1638	Painting
Neptune Calming the Tempest (Quos Ego); modello for the Cardinal Infante's voyage	1635	Painting
Nikolaus Rubens		Drawing
Ochse / Ox	Circa 1618	Drawing
Old Woman and Boy with Candles	Circa 1616–1617	Painting
Pan and Syrinx	Circa 1617	Painting
Perseus and Andromeda		Painting
Perseus frees Andromeda	1620–1622	Painting
Philippe Rubens, the Artist's Brother	1610	Painting
Portrait du duc de Lerma / Study for the Equestrian Portrait of the Duke of Lerma	Circa 1603	Drawing
Portrait of a Bearded Man / Bildnis eines Mannes mit Vollbart	Circa 1604–1605	Drawing
Portrait of a Man, Possibly an Architect or Geographer	1597	Painting
Portrait of Aletheia Talbot, Countess of Arundel	1620	Painting
Portrait of Anne of Austria, Queen of France	Circa 1622	Painting
Portrait of George Gerbier, son of Balthasar Gerbier (identification qualified)	1629–1630	Drawing
Portrait of Isabella Brant (portrait drawing)	Circa 1620–1621	Drawing
Portrait of Louis XIII, King of France	Circa 1622	Painting
Portrait of Marie de Médicis as a Triumphant Queen		Painting
Portrait of Nicolas Trigault in Chinese Costume	1617	Drawing
Portrait of the Emperor Charles V (after Titian)	Circa 1603–1605	Painting
Prometheus Bound		Painting
Romulus and Remus / Romolo e Remo	1612	Painting
Rubens and Isabella Brant in the Honeysuckle Bower	Circa 1609–1610	Painting
Saint George and the Dragon	1606–1608	Painting
Saint Gregory with Saints, venerating the Madonna of Vallicella	1606–1607	Painting
Saint James the Greater / Santiago el Mayor	1610–1612	Painting
Saint Jerome in His Study / Der heilige Hieronymus	Circa 1609–1610	Painting
Saint Sebastian / Der heilige Sebastian	Circa 1612–1618	Painting
Saints Amandus and Walburga, exterior wing of The Elevation of the Cross	1609–1610	Painting
Saints Catherine of Alexandria and Eligius, exterior wing of The Elevation of the Cross	1609–1610	Painting
Salome Presented with the Head of Saint John the Baptist	Circa 1609	Painting
Samson and Delilah	Circa 1609–1611	Painting
Satyr and Maid with Fruit Basket	Circa 1615	Painting
Scipio and Hannibal before the Battle of Zama		Drawing
Self-portrait	1623	Painting
Self-Portrait in a Circle of Friends from Mantua	Circa 1602–1605	Painting
Study of the Laocoön and His Sons (after the ancient Vatican sculpture)	Circa 1600–1608	Drawing
Summer: Peasants Going to Market		Painting
Susanna Fourment	Circa 1620	Drawing
The Adoration of the Magi / L'Adoration des mages	Circa 1617–1618	Painting
The Annunciation	Circa 1610	Painting
The Arrival of the Queen at Lyon (Meeting of King and Queen, 9 December 1600)		Painting
The Assumption of the Virgin Mary	1625–1626	Painting
The Baptism of Christ	1604–1605	Painting
The Battle of Anghiari (drawing after Leonardo's lost composition)		Drawing
The Battle of the Amazons / Die Amazonenschlacht	Circa 1618	Painting
The Capture of Jülich, 1 September 1610		Painting
The Child with the Bird / Das Kind mit dem Vogel		Painting
The Circumcision of Christ / La Circoncisione di Gesù	1605	Painting
The Consequences of War	1638	Painting
The Defeat of Sennacherib / Die Niederlage Sanheribs	Circa 1617	Painting
The Descent from the Cross, triptych	1611–1614	Painting
The Discovery of the Child Erichthonius / Die Auffindung des Erichthoniusknaben	Circa 1616	Painting
The Disembarkation of the Queen at Marseille, 3 November 1600		Painting
The Elevation / Raising of the Cross, triptych	1609–1610	Painting
The Entombment / Graflegging	1615–1617	Drawing
The Fall of Phaeton	Circa 1604–05	Painting
The Feast of Herod	Circa 1635–1638	Painting
The Feast of Venus	1636–1637	Painting
The Garden of Love / El jardín del amor	1630–1635	Painting
The Gonzaga Family in Adoration of the Holy Trinity / La famiglia Gonzaga in adorazione della Santissima Trinità		Painting
The Head of Medusa		Painting
The Hippopotamus and Crocodile Hunt	Circa 1616	Painting
The Holy Family with Saint Anne	Circa 1630	Painting
The Holy Family with Saint Elizabeth and Saint John the Baptist	1614–1615	Painting
The Immaculate Conception	1628–1629	Painting
The Judgement of Paris (Prado early Italian-period version)	1606–1608	Painting
The Kermesse / La Kermesse (also Village Festival)	Circa 1635–1638	Painting
The Lamentation of Christ / Die Beweinung Christi	1610–1611	Painting
The Last Supper / Institution of the Eucharist	1631–1632	Painting
The Lion Hunt / Löwenjagd	1621	Painting
The Massacre of the Innocents		Painting
The Massacre of the Innocents (early Toronto version)	Circa 1610	Painting
The Rainbow Landscape	Circa 1636	Painting
The Rape of the Daughters of Leucippus / Raub der Töchter des Leukippos	Circa 1618	Painting
The Resurrection of Christ, Jan Moretus epitaph triptych	1611–1612	Painting
The Return from the Fields / Ritorno dai campi	Circa 1632–1634	Painting
The Three Graces	1630–1635	Painting
The Triumph of the Eucharist over Idolatry	Circa 1625	Painting
Three Groups of Apostles in a Last Supper (recto); Three Sketches for Medea and Her Children (verso)	About 1601–1602	Drawing
Three Women Holding Garlands (after Francesco Primaticcio)	Circa 1622–1627	Drawing
Two Young Women, the One on the Left Holding a Dog / Zwei junge Frauen, die linke hält einen Hund	Circa 1616–1618	Drawing
Venus and Adonis (Hermitage swan-chariot version)	1610–1611	Painting
Venus and Adonis (Metropolitan Museum late version)		Painting
Venus Frigida	1614	Painting
Venus in Front of the Mirror / The Toilet of Venus	Circa 1614–1615	Painting
Venus Lamenting over the Dead Adonis	Circa 1612	Drawing
Venus, Amor, Bacchus und Ceres / Venus, Cupid, Bacchus and Ceres	Circa 1612–1613	Painting
Wolf and Fox Hunt	Circa 1616	Painting
Young Woman Looking Down (Study for the Head of Saint Apollonia)	Circa 1628	Drawing

Frequently Asked Questions

References

1. Cathedral of Our Lady, Antwerp, L’Assomption de Marie , current object specifications and interpretation. View source
2. Antwerp Churches and Tourism, high altar and Rubens's Our Lady's Assumption. View source
3. Mauritshuis, Rubens's Modello for the Ascension of the Virgin , inventory 926, and research on the Antwerp commission. View source
4. National Gallery of Art, Washington, a workshop-related Assumption after Rubens's modello. View source
5. Jean-Pierre De Bruyn, “Assumption of the Virgin by P. P. Rubens: On a Modello from 1611,” Bulletin of the Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage 39 (2024). View source
6. Julia Burdajewicz, technical study of the Washington Assumption in CATS Proceedings I. View source
7. J. van Herck and J. van Brabant, “De schilderijen van P.P. Rubens in de kathedraal van Antwerpen,” Vlaanderen 26 (1977), including a transcription of Rubens's 1619 contract and payment receipts. View source

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