Why is the virgin Mary so sad in this piece?

"It’s an expression that can be dead, unless we engage ourselves in it."

"It's an expression that can be dead, unless we engage ourselves in it."

Curator Keith Christiansen on "Madonna and Child," a painting by Berlinghiero.

Explore this object:
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/435658

Throughout 2013, The Metropolitan Museum of Art invited curators from across the Museum to each talk about one artwork that changed the way they see the world. Each episode is interpreted by a Museum photographer.

Photography by Mark Morosse

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Consortium, Edward Barbieri, Director, 'I sat down under his shadow' by Edward C Bairstow © Oxford University Press 1925. All rights reserved. Recorded 1998 on Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, Deux-Elles Limited, DXL827

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Contributors

Keith Christiansen
John Pope-Hennessy Chairman, Department of European Paintings

A small wooden carved box featuring figures and a tree in relief.
The author of After Sappho offers a queer feminist reading of Eve and the serpent, reimagining sin as likeness, desire, and bodies transcending gender and species.
Selby Wynn Schwartz
January 9
A close-up detail of a painted face rendered in muted green, blue, and gray tones.
Author Leena Krohn reflects on Helene Schjerfbeck’s portrait of Sigrid Nyberg.
Leena Krohn
December 18, 2025
Black woman wearing all black, standing in front of mannequins dressed in blue, yellow and beige.
Video

Superfine Artist Tanda Francis, shares her inspiration behind the design of the custom mannequins used in the Superfine: Tailoring Black Style exhibition.

October 23, 2025
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Madonna and Child, Berlinghiero  Italian, Tempera on wood, gold ground
Berlinghiero
possibly 1230s