Clipping of Christ

The Clipping of Christ by the Meister des Albrechtsaltares zu Klosterneuburg, painted around 1495, depicts the Circumcision of Christ — the Jewish ritual performed on the eighth day after birth that signified inclusion in the covenant between God and Israel, and that was interpreted in Christian theology as the first shedding of Christ's blood, prefiguring his ultimate sacrifice. The subject, known in German devotional tradition as the Beschneidung or Beschneidungsszene, was among the Feasts of Christ celebrated in the liturgical year and appears frequently in altarpiece cycles devoted to the Infancy of Christ. This painter, active in the Klosterneuburg region, was among the most accomplished Austrian workshop painters of the late fifteenth century, his works combining Austrian Gothic conventions with awareness of Flemish naturalism and the emerging influence of the Danube school.

The composition renders the Circumcision within a temple or domestic interior setting, the priestly officiants arranged around the infant Christ in a grouping that combines the ceremony's formal liturgical character with the tenderness of the Nativity scene. The Austrian workshop style is evident in the precise linear treatment of drapery and the warm, intimate tonality of the interior setting.