Art in CONTEXT

According to the Gospel of John, Mary Magdalen weeps beside Christ's empty tomb after the moment of Resurrection. When the risen Christ appears, the Magdalen first mistakes him for a gardener who may have knowledge of the whereabouts of Christ's body. But soon she recognizes the man as Christ himself and makes a joyous attempt to embrace him. Christ deflects this advance with the instruction that Mary Magdalen is not to touch him since he has not yet ascended to heaven.

This painting is entitled Noli Me Tangere, which corresponds to the words of Christ meaning "touch me not" that are recorded in the Latin Bible. While Christ holds a hoe under his left arm, suggestive of the gardener's guise, the focus of the painting is clearly on the awkward meeting of these biblical characters. Characterized by contrary and almost balletic movements of advance and retreat, of joy and reluctance, the engaging drama between these two perfumed and powdery figures takes place on a shallow, natural stage of equal theatricality. This stage is defined by a mountainous outcrop, a loosely rendered landscape, and a hill town in the distance, painted in muted earth tones that provide neutral and natural contrast to the coloristic brilliance of the robes worn by the protagonists. A stormy, grayish-green sky underscores the tension of the moment, which is further enhanced by the closeness of the figures and by the ambiguous force and position of Christ's gesture, which seems both to resist and seek physical contact with the Magdalen and her breasts.

Sexual nuance, rarified figure types, and extraordinary coloration are common characteristics of 16th century Italian Mannerism, the art historical classification to which Giovanni-Battista Franco's Noli Me Tangere squarely belongs. Franco was a Venetian who left home as a young painter to pursue his craft in Rome, Florence, and Urbino; by 1554 he returned to Venice, where he died in 1561. Throughout his career, Franco was strongly influenced by the famed Michelangelo Buonarroti, and the figure types and exotic colors in his Noli Me Tangere bear witness to a study of Michelangelo's Risen Christ and the Sistine Chapel frescoes. More directly, it is known that Franco produced another painting of Christ's meeting with the Magdalen that was based on a drawing by Michelangelo. That painting, to which the Art Institute's Noli Me Tangere is clearly related, is now in the Casa Buonaroti in Florence. Despite their religious subject, both paintings could well have been produced more as collectors' items than as altarpieces.

Roger J. Crum

SUGGESTED READINGS:

Sobotik, Kent. "Michelangelo's Lost 'Noli Me Tangere.'" The Dayton Art Institute Bulletin (XXXVIII, 1982): 5-8.

Wallace, William E. "Il 'Noli Me Tangere' di Michelangelo: tra sacro e profano." Arte Cristiana (LXXVI, 1988): 443-450.

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