The Nativity 1500 - 1516

Editor: So here we have "The Nativity" painted between 1500 and 1516 by Bernardino Fungai, using tempera. Even in monochrome, there's a sense of quiet reverence that's almost dreamlike. What leaps out at you when you look at it? Curator: You know, it feels as though Fungai pulled a scene straight out of his memory, not necessarily reality. The landscape behind the Holy Family almost feels… separate, doesn't it? As if two worlds coexist. A bustling world out *there*, and an ethereal moment *here*. Editor: Separate, definitely. It's like a stage set, with the main action very close and then... distant activity in the background. Was that a typical technique? Curator: Italian Renaissance art loved flattening perspective, and the Early Renaissance often depicted this kind of "simultaneous narrative." The key players occupy the foreground, yet in the background, you see other smaller narratives taking place all at once. Look closer...can you spot what’s back there? Editor: There’s a procession...are those people on horses? It’s hard to make it out. Curator: Exactly! Details like that enrich the central image by offering secondary storylines for us to contemplate, even now. What is the story behind them and where they are heading to? Are they linked to the Nativity, or going on their way? Who can tell? Editor: That’s interesting. It makes you wonder what else is going on beyond the immediate scene, beyond what we can see, just like our everyday lives. It pulls the viewer in to make them a player somehow, no? Curator: Precisely, almost as though he’s reminding us that even miracles happen in the midst of life. Well, I shall remember Fungai a little differently. Thanks!