Albrecht Dürer (Nuremberg 1471 –1528), Christ among the Doctors, 1506, oil on poplar panel, 65 cm x 80 cm, Madrid, Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum

This intense and peculiar representation of the well-known evangelical episode was made by Dürer in just 5 days during his second stay in Venice (in addition to the artist’s monogram, we can read Opus Quinque Dierum, meaning “made in five days”, on the slip of paper sticking out of the tome in the lower left corner).

Antonio Allegri, known as Correggio (Correggio, Italy 1489 – 1534), Nativity, 1522-1530, oil on poplar wood, cm 256.5 x 188, Dresden, Gemäldegalerie

This large table that Correggio painted for the chapel of the Pratoneri family in the church of San Prospero in Reggio Emilia, Italy, represents an unusual scene. It is night, the special night in which Mary gave birth to Jesus. We know that something special happened that night for there is a warm, very intense light emanating from the child. It is a light that illuminates directly Mary, and then hits the other protagonists of the painting: the woman, the shepherds, the angels and even Joseph, who’s on the background.

Jacopo Carucci, known as Pontormo (Pontorme, 1494  – Florence, 1557), Visitation, around 1528-30, oil on board, cm 202 x 156, Carmignano, Italy, Prepositure of Saints Michael and Francis

Pontormo has set the meeting between Mary and Elizabeth in a dark city street, where some bare, off-scale buildings are visible. The darkness of the scene is pierced by the light that is reflected on the figures in the foreground, on the faces and especially on the drapery.

Lorenzo Lotto (Venice, c. 1480 – Loreto, 1556), Recanati Annunciation, 1527, oil on canvas, 166 cm x 114 cm, Recanati, Civic Museum

The environment in which the scene described by Luke (1: 26-38) takes place is a small room, with a few everyday objects used by Mary, the young woman living in it. On the right side of the painting there’s the mighty and real (we can actually see his shadow on the floor) figure of the angel Gabriel, who almost seems to have glided through the beautiful arched entrance. Above, in the clouds, the figure of God, the one who chose Mary to make her become the Mother of the Lord, His Son Jesus, and the one who sent the angel.