Gefangennahme Christi

This Arrest of Christ panel belongs to the Master of the Freising Passion's extensive cycle for Freising Cathedral, painted around 1485. The scene of Christ's betrayal and arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane, with the kiss of Judas and Peter's sword, was among the most dramatically charged moments in the Passion narrative and a favorite subject for late Gothic painters in Bavaria. This work belongs to the Early Renaissance, the transformative period in European art when painters first applied mathematical perspective, naturalistic figure modeling, and archaeological interest in antiquity to the inherited traditions of medieval devotional painting.

Oil on panel with dramatic nocturnal lighting and the crowded, energetic composition characteristic of the Freising Master. The torches and lanterns create dramatic light effects against the dark garden setting.