Matthias Grünewald - Isenheim altarpiece (one panel - Resurrection)

Title: Isenheim altarpiece (one panel - Resurrection)
Artist: Matthias Grünewald (1470-1528)
Date: 1515
Medium: Oil on wood panel
Dimensions: panel is 269 x 141 cm out of the alterpiece of 336 x 589 cm

The “Isenheim altarpiece” is gigantic (3 meters tall and 6 meters wide). The wing showed here is the “Resurrection”, a very personal depiction of the biblical event by the artist. Christ, wreathed in orange, red, and yellow body halos, showing his stigmas, and bearing a luminous smile, emerges from the tomb, hovers over the sepulcher and the bodies of the sleeping soldiers as he ascends like part of a fireball into heaven. The painting tries to show in one frame the Transfiguration, Resurrection, and Ascension of Jesus Christ.