Deipara Virgo

Deipara Virgo — 'the Virgin who bore God,' a Latin title for Mary as Theotokos (God-bearer) — is a Marian devotional image emphasising the theological centrality of Mary's role in the Incarnation. The title was a deliberate response to Nestorian heresy, which denied the full divine nature of the Christ born of Mary, and its use in the Counter-Reformation carried continued polemical weight against Protestant rejection of Marian veneration. Van Thulden, working within Antwerp's intensely Catholic artistic culture, produced this oil painting for a religious context held by the Vlaamse Kunstcollectie. The image likely presents Mary enthroned with the Christ Child, surrounded by symbols of her theological role. Van Thulden's large religious compositions, produced for churches and private chapels throughout the Southern Netherlands, drew consistently on the Rubens tradition while developing a more restrained personal idiom.

The Deipara Virgo format typically employs a enthroned Madonna composition with the Christ Child displayed to the viewer, the divine maternity made visible through physical proximity and the Child's blessing gesture. Van Thulden's handling of the sacred figures combines idealization — perfect oval faces, graceful drapery — with the human warmth that distinguished Flemish from Roman Baroque religious painting.