The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 19, 2025

Vertically oriented oil painting depicting the Virgin Mary, a woman with light skin tone draped in white and dark blue robes and floating among grey clouds. She crosses her hands in front of her chest, looking up with white light radiating from behind her head and wavy, brown hair. Five nude, winged children gather around the clouds she stands on, holding flowers and a palm leaf. A crescent moon sticks out from under her feet.

The Immaculate Conception

c. 1680

Bartolomé Esteban Murillo

(Spanish, 1617–1682)
Spain, 17th century
oil on canvas
Framed: 246.3 x 152.7 x 8 cm (96 15/16 x 60 1/8 x 3 1/8 in.); Unframed: 220.5 x 127.5 cm (86 13/16 x 50 3/16 in.)
Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund 1959.189
Location: 212 Baroque Painting and Sculpture

Description

The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception maintains that the Virgin Mary was conceived free from sin, therefore ready to be the pure vessel for Christ’s birth. The Immaculate Conception enjoyed intense devotion in Spain during the 1600s, although it was only accepted as official doctrine in 1854. The abstract subject required artists to develop appropriate imagery. The crescent moon, for example, comes from the New Testament vision of Saint John the Evangelist (Revelation 12:1) of “a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet.”
  • Sir Thomas Sebright, Beechwood near Boxmoor, Hertfordshire; [F. Kleinberger &: Co., New York]. Purchase, Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Bequest, 1959.
  • Wixom, Nancy Coe. "The Immaculate Conception." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 47, no. 7 (September 1960): 163-165. Reproduced: cover; Mentioned: p. 163-165 www.jstor.org
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1966. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1966. Reproduced: p. 131 archive.org
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969. Reproduced: p. 131 archive.org
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Reproduced: p. 150 archive.org
    The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Catalogue of Paintings, Part 3: European Paintings of the 16th, 17th, and 18th Centuries. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1982. Reproduced: p. 500; Mentioned: p. 501
    Lurie, Ann Tzeutschler. "More about Valdés Leal's Sketches for Seville's "Assumption of the Virgin" and "Immaculate Conception"." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79, no. 8 (1992): 288-303. Reproduced: p. 288; Mentioned: p. 288-303 www.jstor.org
    Cleveland Museum of Art. Masterworks on Loan: Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the Cleveland Museum of Art: April through June 2016. [Cleveland]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2016. p. 29-30
    Korkow, Cory. “Four Figures on a Step: A masterwork by Bartolomé Esteban Murillo on loan from the Kimball Art Museum.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 56, no. 3 (May/June 2016): 20-21. Reproduced and Mentioned: p. 21 archive.org
  • Fort Worth, TX: Kimbell Art Museum (3/10-6/16/02); Los Angeles, CA: Los Angeles County Museum of Art (7/14-10/6/02) "Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (1617-1682): Paintings from American Collections". Fig, 1, p. 174, exh. cat. no. 28, p. 174, repr. p. 174.
    Dalí and the Spanish Baroque. Salvador Dalí Museum, St. Petersburg, FL (organizer) (February 2-June 24, 2007).
    Salvador Dalí Musuem of Art (2/2/2007 - 6/24/2007): "Dalí and the Spanish Baroque", fig. 24, p. 42-43.
    Bartolomé Esteban Murillo: Paintings from American Collections. Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, TX (organizer) (March 10-June 16, 2002); Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA (July 14-October 6, 2002).
    El Greco to Goya, A Loan Exhibition of Spanish Paintings of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN (organizer) (February 10-March 24, 1963); Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI (February 10-March 24, 1963).
    John Herron Art Museum, Indianapolis, Indiana., February 10-March 24, 1963: "El Greco to Goya: A Loan Exhibition of Spanish Painting of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries," cat. no. 52, pl. 52. Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI April 15- May 26, 1963.
  • {{cite web|title=The Immaculate Conception|url=false|author=Bartolomé Esteban Murillo|year=c. 1680|access-date=19 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1959.189