Sleeping Christ Child
Artist
Caspicara
(Ecuadorian, 1723–1796)
Datelate 1700s
Mediumpainted wood
Dimensions9.4 × 28.5 × 13.5 cm (3 11/16 × 11 1/4 × 5 5/16 in.)
ClassificationsSculpture
Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. Borje F. Jalar
Object number1963.151
DescriptionThe Christ child is shown lying asleep, his head resting on his right arm.Label TextThe churches of colonial Ecuador were decorated with richly painted sculptures of saints and other important figures of Christian history. These works often filled the niches of church altar screens (retablos), which were made of metal or wood and were typically ornately gilded. Images of the Christ child gained popularity in the 1600s and sometimes depicted the infant lying upon the cross of his ultimate crucifixion. The iconography followed St. Thomas Aquinas' belief that Christ's first mortal thought was of his own death. The sculpture bears a resemblance to an Italian ivory carving of the same subject from the 1600s, now housed in the Museum of the Convent of Santo Domingo in Quito, Ecuador.ProvenanceLuis Salguero Collection, Quito, Ecuador; Erik Parmen, Buenos Aires, Argentina, collected in Ecuador before 1957; lent for sale to Mr. and Mrs. Borje F. Jalar, Worcester, MA, 1957; purchased by the Jalars, by 1963; given to the Worcester Art Museum, 1963.
On View
Not on view
