Celestial Variations for Painting the Mantle of the Virgin

Abstract

This article analyzes the blue pigments used in eight mantles of the Virgin in paintings of the sixteenth and seventeenth century, focusing on the blues of the Novohispanic palette and their use in building up layers of oil paint. It also examines the peculiarities in the handling of materials by recognized masters and the systems they devised for applying color to create of one of the most important attributes of the Virgin Mary—her celestial mantle. The color-significance relation bears out the intention of the artist to convey the idea of the sacred by means of the material. This article combines a historical and artistic study of the works with the scientific analysis of samples by means of optical microscopy and scanning electron microscopy.