Sleeping Christ Child
Medium
marble
Dimensions
{"No Extent Specified":{"height":0.63,"width":1.02,"depth":0.42}}
Classification
Sculpture
Department
European Painting and Sculpture
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund
Accession Number
2018.257
Tags
About this artwork
Christ—no longer an infant, but a young child—sprawls on a bed of straw, his head thrown back in slumber and his right arm dangling. The simple radiance framing his head indicates his divinity. Representations of the sleeping Christ child were enduringly popular, not only because of the subject’s inherent charm, but sleep, as a metaphor for death, encouraged pious Christians to meditate on Christ’s humanity and his eventual suffering and death. Filippo Parodi’s Sleeping Christ Child beguiles wit...