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The Adoration of the Magi

late 1750s
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 643
Tiepolo’s compositional ingenuity is apparent everywhere in this oil sketch: the crowded space compressed between the ruins of a triumphal arch, column, and fallen cornice; the impossibly thin and towering ladder; the aggressively foreshortened cow at lower right, and the red-turbaned king’s elbow that juts out towards the viewer. Tiepolo varied the skin tones of the three magi, or wise men, and their pages to contrast with those of the Holy Family and underscore their arrival from distant lands. While probably made in preparation for an altarpiece, the sketch, with its animated paint handling, appealed to collectors in its own right.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: The Adoration of the Magi
  • Artist: Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (Italian, Venice 1696–1770 Madrid)
  • Date: late 1750s
  • Medium: Oil on canvas
  • Dimensions: 23 3/4 x 18 3/4 in. (60.3 x 47.6 cm)
  • Classification: Paintings
  • Credit Line: Rogers Fund, 1937
  • Object Number: 37.165.1
  • Curatorial Department: European Paintings

More Artwork

More Artwork
Allegory of the Planets and Continents, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo Italian, Oil on canvas
Allegory of the Planets and Continents
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo
1752
Lobster-Tail Burgonet, Steel, leather, gold, North Italian
Lobster-Tail Burgonet
North Italian
ca. 1610
Bacchus and Ariadne, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo Italian, Pen and brown ink, brown wash, over black chalk.
Bacchus and Ariadne
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo
ca. 1740
Armor, Steel, copper alloy, textile, leather, Italian
Armor
Italian
ca. 1400–1450 and later
François de Jullienne (1722–1754) and Marie Elisabeth de Jullienne (Marie Elisabeth de Séré de Rieux, 1724–1795), Charles Antoine Coypel French, Pastel, black chalk, watercolor, and traces of black chalk underdrawing on four joined sheets of handmade blue laid paper, mounted on canvas and adhered to a keyed stretcher
François de Jullienne (1722–1754) and Marie Elisabeth de Jullienne (Marie Elisabeth de Séré de Rieux, 1724–1795)
Charles Antoine Coypel
1743

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