Christ on the Cross between the two criminals

Christ on the Cross Between the Two Criminals (c. 1620), in the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp, presents the Crucifixion as a monumental three-cross composition with the two thieves flanking Christ. Van Dyck invests the scene with powerful emotional drama, the contorted bodies of the thieves contrasting with Christ's more serene suffering. The painting dates from Van Dyck's first Antwerp period when he was producing ambitious religious compositions alongside his work in Rubens's workshop. The Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp holds the painting as part of its exceptional collection of Flemish Baroque art, which naturally emphasizes works by Antwerp's two greatest seventeenth-century painters, Rubens and Van Dyck, alongside their precursors and followers.

The dramatic composition arranges the three crosses against a darkening sky, with the central figure of Christ creating a powerful vertical axis. Van Dyck's handling of the dying figures shows his study of both Rubens and Italian Baroque masters.