This painting has puzzled me as a boy when in Brugge …

Lovely poem!

Very nice!
Thanks,
Clay

I am glad to be back and read your well penned pieces. TX

Weel written Patrick

Interesting and intriguing

Sorry, I need to dissapoint you,but this is not Mary Magdalene, but the Saint Catherine, depicted in relation to one of her mystical visions. Why this is so difficult to understand, and why we need to smuggle Mary Magdalene into it? (And St.Catherine was not the only one who had the mystical marriage experience. Guys, please research art history, and the history of the saints before making such claims. I know, Mary Magdalene is all rage now, very fashionable, but don\’t falsify history of other saint in her name, as the other saint has her own precious legacy. Such sensationalistic approprations as the above has just only a gossip value.Which means is invented, and going against the painter\’s, real authors intent.Should we not respect this? Is the painter who intended this scene as depicting St Catherine not important enough, but he needs to yield the fantasy of today\’s people and their confabulations? How much we really value art history and the authors of art? Why we need to bend the truth to our own excitement? Sorry, but this is tabloid-like art history, nothing more.

PS
And it is grown Jesus who puts the ring on St Catherine’s finger,as he was the groom in her vision, not the boyish Jesus. Child Jesus would be very, very unusual, and show that the painter didn’t know the subject.Again, research art history please.

Sorry if I was sounding too harsh.We don’t see here Madonna with child, so why this is unusual? Virgin is also depicted as Ecclesia, meaning church, not always mother. But I understand that things maybe confusing for people without art history background, and again, sorry if I sounded too harsh.

Very nice. I didn’t know Patrick Bernauw is an excellent poet too