Marian Art in The Catholic Church - Immaculate Conception

Immaculate Conception

Given that up to the 13th century a series of saints including Bernard of Clairvaux, Bonaventure, Thomas Aquinas, and the Dominicans in general had either opposed or questioned this doctrine, Roman Catholic art on the subject mostly dates to periods after the 15th century and is absent from Renaissance art. But with support from popular opinion, the Franciscans and theologians such as Blessed Duns Scotus, the popularity of the doctrine increased and a feast-day for it was promoted.

Pope Pius V, the Dominican Pope who in 1570 established the Tridentine Mass, included the feast (but without the adjective "Immaculate") in the Tridentine Calendar, but suppressed the existing special Mass for the feast, directing that the Mass for the Nativity of Mary (with the word "Nativity" replaced by "Conception") be used instead. Part of that earlier Mass was revived in the Mass that Pope Pius IX ordered to be used on the feast and that is still in use.

In the 16th century there was a widespread intellectual fashion for emblems in both religious and secular contexts. These consisted of a visual representation of the symbol (pictura) and usually a Latin motto; frequently an explanatory epigram was added. Emblem books were very popular.

Drawing on the emblem tradition, Francisco Pacheco established an iconography that influenced artists such as Murillo, Diego Velázquez and others. This style of representation of the immaculate Conception then spread to the rest of Europe, and has since remained the usual depiction.

The dogmatic definition of Immaculate Conception was performed by Pope Pius IX in his Apostolic Constitution Ineffabilis Deus, in 1854. The dogma gained additional significance from the apparitions of Our Lady of Lourdes in 1858, with the lady in the apparition identifying herself as "the Immaculate Conception" and the faithful believing her to be the Blessed Virgin Mary.