Many famous artists have portrayed the nativity from the early middle ages until now. The earliest paintings we know date from the beginning of the 4th century. Mary was the center of these early images – lying in the grotto of the nativity wearing her blue garment and crowned with a large halo. Ox and donkey were there and the shepherds. Joseph didn’t become a consistent part of the nativity scene until the 6th century. Let’s watch how this scene develops through the centuries.

1. Unknown Master, Nativity Scene in Castelseprio (9th century)

2. Unknown Master, Nativity Scene in Cappello Palatina Palermo (1150)

3. Giotto di Bondone, Nativity Scene in the Lower Church of San Francesco d’Assisi (1304 und 1306)

4. Duccio di Buoninsegna, The Nativity with the Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel (1308-11)

5. Unknown Master, Byzantine Fresco in the Peribleptos-Church Mistra, Greece (mid-14th century)

6. Gentile da Fabriano, Adoration of the Magi (1423)

7. Rogier van der Weyden, Bladelin Triptych (1445-48)

8. Francesco di Giorgio Martini, Nativity (1460)

9. Piero della Francesca, Nativity (1470-75)

10. Hugo van der Goes, Portinari Altarpiece (c.1475)

11. Geertgen tot Sint Jans, Birth of Jesus (1484-90)

12. Lorenzo Costa, Nativity (1490)

13. Sandro Botticelli, The Mystical Nativity (1500-1501)

14. Jan Gossaert, The Adoration of the Kings (1510-15)

15. Albrecht Altdorfer, Nativity (c.1513)

16. Matthias Grünewald, Concert of Angels and Nativity (1515)

17. Pieter Bruegel the Elder, Anbetung der Heiligen drei Könige (1564)

18. El Greco, The Nativity (1603-05)

19. Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, Nativity with San Lorenzo and San Francesco (1609)

20. Georges de La Tour, L’adoration des bergers (c.1645)

21. Rembrandt, Adoration of the Shepherds (1646)

22. Nicholas Poussin, Nativité (c.1653)

23. Arthur Hughes, Nativity (1857-58)

24. Paul Gauguin, Geburt Christi, des Gottessohnes (1896)