Virgin and Child Crowned by Angels (c. 1490): Artwork and History

Virgin and Child Crowned by Angels (c. 1490) is in the Art Institute of Chicago collection. The museum lists its creator attribution as Colijn de Coter (Netherlandish, c. 1450– by 1540).

The work and its context

The Art Institute of Chicago describes the work:

The gold text on the bottom edge of the Virgin Mary’s red mantle translates as “Hail, Queen of the heavens, Mother of the king of angels.” These lines, from a hymn called a Marian antiphon, were famously set to music as a choral composition in the 15th century. This kind of polyphonic music, requiring multiple trained voices employed at great expense, was associated with the extravagant culture of the Brussels court. Its evocation here, like the bejeweled crown lowered onto Mary’s head, serves to honor the Virgin and to inspire aural worship.

Object facts

• Title: Virgin and Child Crowned by Angels
• Date: c. 1490
• Artist attribution: Colijn de Coter (Netherlandish, c. 1450– by 1540)
• Place of origin: Belgium
• Medium: Oil on panel
• Dimensions: 151.9 × 88.6 cm (59 13/16 × 34 7/8 in.); Framed: 179.8 × 117.2 × 16.6 cm (70 3/4 × 46 1/8 × 6 1/2 in.)
• Type: Painting
• Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe
• Reference number: 1933.1039

Collection credit

Mr. and Mrs. Martin A. Ryerson Collection

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The description above is credited to the Art Institute of Chicago and reused under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0; HTML formatting has been converted to plain text. Other catalogue metadata and the public-domain image are provided under CC0 1.0.