Christ Preaching in the Temple

Jan Polack painted this Christ Preaching in the Temple around 1480 for a church in or near Munich. Polack's dramatic, energetically composed scenes brought vitality to devotional painting in late fifteenth-century Bavaria. The subject of Christ teaching in the temple emphasized his role as divine instructor and his authority over the religious establishment. The oil medium allowed for rich tonal transitions and glazed layers of color that created luminous depth impossible with the older tempera technique.

Oil on panel with Polack's characteristic vigorous figure drawing and dramatic narrative staging. The temple setting and the crowd listening to Christ are rendered with the energetic compositions typical of his work.