The Risen Christ in Glory

Rosso Fiorentino painted this Risen Christ in Glory around 1530, following his flight from Rome after the Sack of 1527 and before his arrival at the French court of Francis I in 1530. The Resurrection subject allowed Rosso to explore the contrast between Christ's wounded, suffering humanity and his glorified divine nature, a theological duality that suited his own interest in psychological complexity and formal tension. His Christ figures in this period have a supernatural physical intensity—the body both human and divine, the color both naturalistic and otherworldly—that reflects the Mannerist generation's departure from the serene human ideals of the High Renaissance. This work anticipates the decorative style Rosso would develop at Fontainebleau, which transformed French court art.

The panel displays Rosso's distinctive late Italian style with luminous, otherworldly color and the elongated figure of Christ dissolved in celestial radiance.