Bartolomé Esteban Murillo - The Holy family with a bird

Title: The Holy family with a bird
Artist: Bartolomé Esteban Murillo (1617-1682)
Date: 1650
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 144 x 188 cm

“The Holy Family with a little bird” is a painting of Mary, Joseph and Jesus. Jesus is holding a little bird and standing in front of a little white puppy who seems to want to go for the bird. Jesus seems to know that and be playing the situation as a child typically would.

The painting is very much a domestic scene, exalting family life filled with tenderness- Mary and Joseph are looking at their child Jesus; Jesus is leaning on his dad who is securing him; Mary is winding thread as the Bible says she knows to do; the tools of Joseph who is a carpenter are represented behind him; Joseph has wrinkles on his forehead as if worried for his son; the puppy in the foreground accentuates this feeling of loving, nuclear family