Descent from the Cross

A body lowered, a weight shared

The white cloth in Peter Paul Rubens's Descent from the Cross falls in a broad diagonal from the upper left toward the people below. Christ's pale body lies across it, head and arm hanging down. Men on ladders steady the cloth and his shoulders; a figure in red braces beneath him. Mary reaches from the left, and women at the bottom receive him. The scene is filled with hands because no one person could bear the weight alone. Rubens makes the work of lowering a body the centre of the painting.

The image on this page shows the centre panel of a larger altarpiece. The Cathedral of Our Lady in Antwerp^[2], where the work is displayed, dates the entire triptych to 1611–14 and records it as oil on panel. The centre measures 421 × 311 centimetres; each wing measures 421 × 153 centimetres. The central subject gives the whole work its familiar title, but the wing paintings change how that subject is read. They show other moments in which Christ is carried.

At a Glance

• ArtistPeter Paul Rubens ^[1]
• Date1611–14 ^[1]
• MediumOil on panel; triptych ^[1]
• DimensionsCentre 421 × 311 cm; each wing 421 × 153 cm ^[1]
• CollectionCathedral of Our Lady, Antwerp ^[1]
• Image scopeCentral panel only ^[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 Garden of Love

1630–35

The Three Graces

1630–35

Contents

1. Following the descent through the central panel
2. Why the wings matter
3. How the guild and the church shaped the design
4. A small study before the immense altarpiece
5. How did the central scene travel in print?
6. An Antwerp altarpiece, not an isolated picture

Following the descent through the central panel

The eye begins near the top of the cross, where figures lean across its beam. The shroud hangs from their hands and runs under Christ's back. Its bright surface lets the viewer follow the body through a dark setting. Christ's head drops beside the cloth; his right arm hangs without helping to control the movement. Rubens asks the living figures to do all of that work. The diagonal is therefore both a compositional route and a practical problem: how to get a heavy body safely to the ground.

An Antwerp church heritage account^[3] identifies the men who help with the removal as Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, followers who appear in the burial accounts of the Gospels. John, in a striking red garment at the front, takes much of the weight. Mary stands in blue to the left, stretching toward her son. At the lower edge, Mary Magdalene supports Christ's foot while Mary of Clopas reaches toward the shroud. Their positions form a chain from the crossbeam to the ground: a viewer can trace one person's grip to the next.

Small objects at the lower right bring the act of crucifixion into the scene. The church account identifies the nails and crown of thorns laid in a dish. They do not compete with the body for attention, yet they fix what has just happened. Rubens contrasts their sharpness with the broad, soft fold of cloth supporting Christ. He also sets John's red and Mary's blue against a largely dark background, so their attempts to help remain legible even when the painting is seen from a distance.

The centre does not show Christ already laid in a tomb. The action is still underway. One figure leans precariously over the crossbeam; John steadies himself below; the women wait where the body will arrive. That suspended effort gives the scene its emotional force. The grief is visible, but it is expressed through care and physical cooperation as much as through faces.

The uppermost helper's position is especially precarious. The Antwerp heritage description notes that the man at the right of the crossbeam uses his teeth to hold the shroud while his free hand supports Christ's arm. The detail is small in a reproduction but important to the painting's logic: each part of his body has a task, and even so the descent remains difficult. Below, Magdalene takes the foot onto her shoulder. These actions link the high crossbar to the floor through practical contacts, not through a merely elegant line. The white cloth is both a visual pathway and the means by which the body is actually carried.

Rubens also lets the group show different kinds of grief. Mary reaches toward Christ without controlling his fall; John must bear weight; Mary of Clopas touches the shroud. The church's account calls attention to tears on Mary of Clopas's face, a quieter detail within the large physical undertaking. The faces and hands keep the picture from becoming an impersonal anatomy lesson. Yet the mourners do not all perform the same gesture, so their responses feel like those of several people sharing one terrible task.

Why the wings matter

When the triptych is open, the cathedral identifies^[2] the Visitation on the left wing and the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple on the right. In the first, Mary, pregnant with Jesus, visits her relative Elizabeth, who is pregnant with John the Baptist. In the second, the infant Jesus is brought to the Temple and received by Simeon. Those scenes come from different stages of Jesus's life; the centre takes the viewer to its end. Their order does not make the three panels a single continuous episode.

The connection is an act of bearing. Mary carries Christ before his birth; Simeon receives him as a child; the mourners carry his dead body. The cathedral's interpretation draws this thread through the open altarpiece. It also links the inner scenes to the outer wings, which form a scene from the legend of Saint Christopher when the work is closed. Christopher is traditionally understood as a bearer of Christ. This is a way to read the triptych's design, not a quotation from Rubens explaining his intentions. The centre-panel reproduction here cannot show the wings, so their subjects need to be kept distinct from what appears in the image.

That narrative changes with the wings' position. A viewer arriving when the triptych was closed would encounter Christopher carrying the Christ Child, the guild's own patron in action. When open, the saint gave way to three scenes across Christ's life. A modern photograph of only the centre cannot convey that alternation. It matters because the guild did not simply attach its emblem to a biblical picture; its patron and the biblical figures were linked by the recurring act of carrying. The exterior and interior offered different entry points into the same commission.

The outer scene was particularly fitting for the people who commissioned the altarpiece. The Antwerp church heritage account identifies the patron as the city's guild of arquebusiers, whose patron saint was Christopher. An arquebus was a firearm; the guild was part of Antwerp's civic militia. Its altar was in the cathedral's south transept, close to where the triptych stands today. The heritage account says the centre was installed in 1612 and the wings completed the commission in 1614. The cathedral's broader 1611–14 dating is the safest concise date for the completed work.

How the guild and the church shaped the design

The commission can be traced more closely than a general attribution to a guild. An Antwerp church exhibition account^[7] dates the agreement between the arquebusiers and Rubens to 7 September 1611, with the guild leader and Antwerp mayor Nicolaas Rockox present. It reports that the complete triptych was consecrated on 22 July 1614 and that Rubens received the full 2,400 guilders only by the end of 1621. These dates turn a single label such as “1611–14” into a sequence: agreement, central panel, completed wings, and later payment. They also place the painting in the civic relationships Rubens maintained after returning from Italy.

The same account explains a design constraint. The guild initially considered an image of its patron Christopher. A 1610 diocesan decision, however, limited central altarpiece subjects to scenes from Christ's life or the New Testament. Christopher was therefore placed on the closed exterior wings. The open centre could show the removal of Christ's body, while the other open panels extend the theme of bearing him across his life. This is more than a clever link found by modern viewers: the guild's patron saint and the church's rule helped determine where the subjects could appear.

The source also proposes light as a second theme across the panels. In the centre, Christ's pale body and the white shroud stand out against darkness; on the Presentation wing, Simeon receives the child traditionally called the light of the world. That interpretation is most persuasive when the triptych is seen as an open whole. It cannot be confirmed by a photograph of the central panel alone, though the bright cloth in that image makes its part of the argument visible.

The Antwerp church heritage reading^[13] follows that light across both sides of the altarpiece. On the Presentation wing, Simeon receives the infant and the account connects his praise to the Gospel of Luke's promise of light to the nations. On the closed wings, an hermit holds a lantern while Christopher carries the child across water; the child's pale body catches the strongest light. The interpretation creates a second way of reading the panels alongside the more obvious sequence of people bearing Christ. It remains a reading of the whole triptych, rather than a reason to describe lantern or Simeon as visible in this page's centre-only photograph.

The same church account identifies an unusually direct link to the guild leadership inside the biblical scene. It describes a dark-haired, bearded man near the left edge of the Presentation wing as a portrait of Nicolaas Rockox, the mayor and guild leader involved in the commission. The account explains his placement on a wing rather than the central sacred scene by reference to a rule against showing a living person's portrait on the centre panel. This is the site's identified portrait, not a sitter document reproduced here. It gives the open triptych a contemporary point of contact while keeping the principal subject on Christ's life. The portrait is another detail lost when the altarpiece is represented only by its central panel.

A small study before the immense altarpiece

The Courtauld Gallery^[4] holds a distinct oil study for the central subject. It considers the work likely to have been shown to the guild and cathedral custodians for approval before the large altarpiece was painted; “likely” is important because a surviving approval record for that precise presentation is not supplied. The Courtauld also holds small studies for the wing scenes. These works make the design process tangible: Rubens could work through the descending body and the relationship among three panels at a scale far smaller than the finished cathedral installation.

The study's existence should not blur the page's object identity. The familiar Antwerp centre panel measures more than four metres high; the Courtauld painting is a separate preparatory work in London. A close-up of the Antwerp image cannot tell us which changes Rubens made between all the studies and the completed ensemble. It does show the finished solution: the cloth provides a bright path under the body, and the helpers connect its high point to the people waiting below. The small study helps explain why this arrangement was planned, while the finished altarpiece shows how it works at congregational scale.

The Courtauld's collection record^[5] identifies its central-panel study as oil on panel, 115.2 × 76.2 centimetres, inventory P.1947.LF.359, dated 1611–13. Its provenance is much later than the Antwerp commission: the secure chain includes Lord Methuen by 1806, later British owners and a 1947 bequest to the Courtauld; an earlier association with the Duc de Richelieu is marked “perhaps.” That uncertainty matters because a preparatory study can help explain an artist's process without giving us a complete record of where the study was kept or seen immediately after the commission. The Antwerp altarpiece's ownership and movement must be followed separately.

The wings also have surviving design evidence beyond the Courtauld's oil sketches. The Metropolitan Museum of Art holds Rubens's ink study for the Presentation in the Temple^[6], the open right wing. The small sheet, 21.4 × 14.2 centimetres, records Rubens blocking in and revising the figures. The Met points out a particular change: Simeon and the prophetess Anna exchange places between this study and the final painting in Antwerp. That is a more exact account of revision than simply saying that Rubens made sketches. The drawing belongs to the wing's development, not to the lowering scene on the centre panel; its earlier-dated verso is also a different stage of work from its 1611 recto.

The triptych also travelled after its making. It was taken to Paris under French rule. Antwerp church heritage^[8] dates the return of the confiscated paintings to the city to December 1815; its account of the Descent places the triptych back in the church in 1816, a short distance from its first site in the south transept. Arrival in Antwerp and reinstallation at the cathedral are different milestones. Its present setting therefore preserves the church context but not every detail of the original hang.

The movement had changed the work's audience as well as its address. Gaëtane Maës, in a study of the triptych's changing display^[9], traces its removal from Antwerp in 1794 and its presentation in the Paris museum. She asks how people understood an altarpiece when it moved between a place of worship and a collection of celebrated art. Her argument is that devotion and appreciation of the painting's artistry had long coexisted in Flemish viewing; the shift to Paris altered that relationship rather than suddenly creating admiration for Rubens. That is a useful way to understand the two histories of this object. It was admired before the seizure, but its liturgical role depended on a church, altar and changing open and closed views that a museum display could not reproduce in the same way.

The point also qualifies easy language about “returning home.” The triptych came back to Antwerp and was set up again in the cathedral, but it did not erase the Paris episode or exactly resume its first physical position. Today a centre-panel photograph travels still farther from the original setting. The image can bring Christ's descending body close to a reader; it cannot recreate the guild's altar, the exterior Christopher scene or the viewer's movement around a monumental three-panel work. Those differences are reasons to identify the reproduced panel precisely and to describe the whole ensemble in the article.

How did the central scene travel in print?

Before the altarpiece was removed to Paris, its central image was already circulating separately. The Rijksmuseum records a 1620 engraving by Lucas Vorsterman^[10], made after Rubens's painting. Its sheet measures roughly 58.5 × 43.5 centimetres: large for a print, yet much smaller than the cathedral's 421-centimetre-high centre panel. Vorsterman could carry the descending figure, shroud and helping hands onto paper, but the print did not reproduce the coloured contrast of Mary's blue, John's red and Christ's pale body, or the changing experience of the triptych's wings. It gave viewers a distinct way to know the central composition outside the guild's chapel.

The route from panel to engraving can be followed through another surviving object. The Louvre catalogues a drawing, INV 20311 recto^[11], specifically as made for Vorsterman's engraving after the Antwerp centre panel. It is about 55 × 43 centimetres and combines pen, washes, chalk and white heightening; the record also notes pricking for transfer. That preparation distinguishes it from the Courtauld's earlier oil study for the painting. The Louvre's maker field calls the sheet a copy after Rubens, so it should not be presented as a newly verified autograph drawing by him. The sequence is three different objects with different purposes: the small oil design, the monumental painted centre and the drawing for a reproductive print.

The print's reach can be described more exactly than saying that the picture became famous. In the Rijksmuseum's catalogue of Pieter de Grebber's Descent from the Cross of 1633^[12], the author notes the Antwerp painting and Vorsterman's engraving as possible ways De Grebber knew Rubens's treatment. This does not make De Grebber's picture a direct copy of the cathedral panel or prove which route he used. It shows why the print matters to the history of this work: painters could encounter an Antwerp altar composition in a portable form and then make different decisions in their own paintings.

An Antwerp altarpiece, not an isolated picture

The subject of Christ's dead body did not end with this triptych. In the Getty Museum's separate Entombment, dated about 1612 in its current account^[1], Rubens brought mourners close around the body at a stone slab. John, again in red, supports Christ; Mary holds his head; Mary Magdalene and another Mary grieve nearby. The Getty painting is oil on canvas, roughly 131 × 130 centimetres, a very different size and support from the Antwerp triptych's central panel. Getty considers it probably intended for a small chapel altar, though that destination is not documented as firmly as the guild commission in Antwerp. It is a related treatment of Christ after the Crucifixion, not a preparatory study for the cathedral picture.

The comparison helps locate the exact choice Rubens made for the cathedral. In Antwerp, many people cooperate to lower a body that is still suspended between cross and ground; a broad white shroud and ladders carry the action over more than four metres of panel. In Getty's painting, the removal is over and Christ lies among mourners at the edge of burial. The smaller composition brings attention to his wounds, altered skin and the grief of those touching him. Getty points to wheat beside the body and a stone that recalls an altar, reading them as links to the Eucharist. Those details belong to the Getty canvas, and they should not be imported into a description of the Antwerp centre. Together the paintings show Rubens changing scale, setting and the stage of the story to shape different encounters with the Passion.

The size of the panels matters. At more than four metres high, the centre presented Christ's lowered body to a congregation in a church, with the surrounding wings visible when open and the Christopher scene visible when closed. It was made to work across those viewing states. A centre-only photograph lets us study the shroud, the descending figure and the helpers closely, but it removes the sequence of Visitation, Presentation and Christopher that belongs to the object.

Rubens's nearby Elevation of the Cross offers a useful comparison. Its central action drives Christ and the cross upward with a group of straining figures. Here the force travels down, and the people attempt to restrain it. Both are monumental triptychs in Antwerp's cathedral, yet their movements and wing subjects are different. The contrast helps explain why the Descent can feel quiet even though almost every figure is physically engaged.

The painting's fame developed across centuries of changing display. Antwerp church heritage records an admiring response from Leopold Mozart in 1765 and describes how the confiscated triptych later hung in the Louvre's Grande Galerie. Such evidence shows that the work was valued by visitors before the modern tourist circuit formed around it. Its reputation encouraged copies and adaptations; the same heritage account calls it exceptionally frequently copied among Rubens's works. Those responses are part of the altarpiece's afterlife, but they should not erase its first role as a picture made for the arquebusiers' altar and for changing open and closed views within worship.

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. J. Paul Getty Museum, The Entombment , about 1612, object details and close-looking account. View source
2. Cathedral of Our Lady, Antwerp, The Descent from the Cross : date, medium, dimensions and wing subjects. View source
3. Antwerp Churches and Tourism, The Descent from the Cross : guild history and detailed iconography. View source
4. The Courtauld, Rubens's preparatory Descent from the Cross. View source
5. Courtauld Gallery collection record P.1947.LF.359, material, dimensions and qualified provenance for the preparatory study. View source
6. Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rubens's 1611 Presentation in the Temple drawing for the open right wing. View source
7. Antwerp Churches and Tourism, 2004 exhibition account of the arquebusiers' agreement, iconographic rule, payment and later movement. View source
8. Antwerp Churches and Tourism, cathedral building history and December 1815 return of confiscated paintings. View source
9. Gaëtane Maës, “From Antwerp Cathedral to the Musée Napoléon,” Netherlands Yearbook for History of Art 65 (2015). View source
10. Rijksmuseum, Lucas Vorsterman's 1620 engraving after the Antwerp Descent. View source
11. Louvre, INV 20311 recto, drawing for Vorsterman's engraving after the Antwerp centre panel. View source
12. Rijksmuseum, catalogue of Pieter de Grebber's separate 1633 Descent from the Cross. View source
13. Antwerp church heritage reading. View source

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