Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/81002
Title: St. Mary Magdalene and St. Agatha : an art historical gazetteer of their paintings in Malta
Authors: Agius, Victoria (2006)
Keywords: Mary Magdalene, Saint
Agatha, Saint, -approximately 250
Painting -- Malta
Christian women saints in art
Issue Date: 2006
Citation: Agius, V. (2006). St. Mary Magdalene and St. Agatha : an art historical gazetteer of their paintings in Malta (Bachelor’s dissertation).
Abstract: The purpose of this dissertation was intended primarily to compile a chronological survey of religious paintings, illustrating St. Mary Magdalene and St. Agatha in Malta by placing them in their proper art historical context. The two female Saints have been dealt with separately as they are very much unrelated and throughout the entire course of my study, there emerged more differences than similarities. With the exception of two pala d'altare included for reasons of important artistic significance, the Magdalene's iconographic presence at the Golgotha scene, namely the Crucifixion, Lamentation and Deposition have been, on the recommendation of my supervisor, ruled out owing to a previous undergraduate study of the theme. Focus has been placed on the image of the Penitent Magdalene who emerges as one of the favoured Saints of the Catholic Counter Reformation in the 16th and 17th centuries. While the Penitent Saint was commissioned exclusively for private patronage, the much venerated image of St. Agatha drew the people's devotion by means of a growing cult which was intensified by the Hospitaller Knights of St. John who established themselves in Malta in 1530. My point of departure initiates with the re-Christianisation of Malta in the Late Medieval period. Since their re-Christianisation, the Maltese Islands had been well ingrained in their local traditions and staunch religious convictions. Sacred art had been the most powerful visual force that dominated the artistic scenario right up to the turn of the century. Because vernacular art played such a key role in the course of the Islands' artistic evolution, it was fundamental to treat these paintings with much consideration particularly since folk history was the determining factor in the propagation of a cult. These works of art reflected a budding native style which was to germinate into full flowering in the High Baroque period.
Description: B.A.(HONS)HIST.OF ART
URI: https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/81002
Appears in Collections:Dissertations - FacArt - 1999-2010
Dissertations - FacArtHa - 2002-2007

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