The Madonna of the Pinks

Mary offers delicate flowers to the child on her lap. His attention follows them, and her face answers with an affectionate expression. The pinks in the title are carnations, whose small stems give their hands something to share. Raphael, an Italian painter, made this little image around 1506–07. The figures sit in a palace bedchamber, with a green bed curtain behind them and a glimpse of sunlit landscape through a window. The setting makes their encounter feel close and domestic. Carnations carried a religious meaning as symbols of divine love and of Christ’s future suffering. A viewer could enjoy the tenderness between mother and child while thinking about the events still ahead of them. The painting may have been small enough to hold during prayer. Look at the contrast between the pale skin and the darker room, then at the movement of the child’s hands. Raphael gives the familiar subject a lively exchange rather than a fixed pose. The picture was long considered a copy before being recognised again as his work in 1991.