Template:POTD/2019-05-21
The Annunciation is an oil-on-oak panel painting attributed to the Early Netherlandish painter Hans Memling. It depicts the Annunciation, the announcement by the archangel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary that she would conceive and become the mother of Jesus, described in the Gospel of Luke. Completed c. 1482, it was partially transferred to canvas in the 1920s. The panel shows Mary in a domestic interior with two attendant angels; Gabriel is dressed in ecclesiastical robes, while a dove representing the Holy Spirit hovers above Mary. It expands upon the Annunciation wing of Rogier van der Weyden's c. 1455 Saint Columba Altarpiece. According to art historian Maryan Ainsworth, the work is a "startlingly original image, rich in connotations for the viewer or worshiper". The painting is held in the Robert Lehman collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.Painting credit: Hans Memling