Descent from the Cross - Peter Paul Rubens

This has been a special day as our workshop framed a replica art print by Peter Paul Rubens, The Descent from the Cross right on 6 April, Good Friday of 2012.  The original oil painting is the central panel of a triptych painting inside Cathedral of Our Lady, Antwerp, Belgium by Rubens in 1612-1614.  During Napoleon's reign this painting and The Raising the Cross were removed and taken to Paris. They were returned to the Cathedral in the late 1800s.


Descent from the Cross is the scene from the Gospels' accounts of Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus taking Christ down from the cross after his crucifixion (John 19:38-42).  Theophile Silvestre wrote, in his "On Rubens' Descent from the Cross - 1868":

“The principal subject is composed of nine figures: at the top of two ladders,
workers are lowering the body of Christ with the aid of a shroud which one of them holds in his teeth,the other in the left hand.
Bracing themselves firmly against the arms of the cross,
each bends forward to guide the Christ with the hand that is left free while St. John,
with one foot on the ladder and his back arched, supports him most energetically.
One of Savior’s feet comes to rest on the beautiful shoulder of the Magdalene,
grazing her golden hair.
Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, placed midway on ladders so as to face each other, 
form, together with the two workmen in the upper part of the picture, a square of vigorous but plebeian figures.
The Virgin, standing at the foot of the sacrificial tree, extends her arms towards her Son;
Salome (properly, Mary Cleophas), kneeling, gathers up her robe.
On the ground are seen the superscription and a copper basin where the crown of thorns and the nails of the Crucifixion lie in the congealed blood.
The crowd, always elated by the spectacle of torture, has departed from Golgotha as daylight fades.
After the sacrifice of Calvary, as it is called in Scripture, the sad, dark sky is crossed by a light that illumines the shoulders of the workmen, whose bold posture recalls the composition by Daniele da Volterra".
1 Corinthians 15:3  

Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures