The Holy Kinship

Carlo Cignani's Holy Kinship, painted in 1676, depicts the extended family of Christ — Mary, Joseph, Elizabeth, Zacharias, and the infant John the Baptist — in a domestic devotional grouping. The subject was popular in Counter-Reformation painting as it emphasised the familial and human dimensions of the Incarnation. Cignani was the pre-eminent Bolognese painter of his generation, and his treatment combines the inherited classical tradition with his own characteristic graceful figure style.

Multiple figures are arranged in a warm domestic grouping around the Christ Child, the infants Jesus and John the Baptist at the centre. Cignani's smooth, idealised figure style and warm palette give the composition an appealing serenity. His characteristic sfumato transitions between shadow and light are evident in the careful modelling of the figures' faces.