The Announcement to Mary According to Saint Angelic (Second Part)
In the third cell of the Annunciation, the space is simplified.
The room is seen only from the entrance way on the far right. The event still takes place in the elevated porch over the grassed area surrounded by a fence, but the forest beyond the wall limit visible to the left has disappeared, and the grass is merely an indication of this side of the wall. A portion of the porch has vanished. The room opens towards the source of light that casts shadows on the floor at the center and on the right-hand wall. It’s all, not a part like in the corridor, reserved for contemplation by the preachers’ friars as seems to be confirmed by the presence in the painting of Saint Peter of Verona, the Dominican martyr.
The impression is once again strong and immediate, an echo direct from the Song of Songs:
> «You are a locked garden, my sister, my spouse, a locked garden and a sealed fountain» (4:12).
The room opens again towards the source, and we, facing the sunset light, witness the event taking place between heaven and earth, in a sort of continuation of the intimacy of the cell on both sides of the wall. The space is complex, very elegant. There’s nothing beyond. The arborized garden of the Announcement in the corridor has been transformed into a very tidy garden with palm trees and terracotta pots. The cypresses, aligned behind the fence here are arranged in a scenic avenue with a border wall, also decorated, along with the cloister’s crowning, with terracotta pots facing the central fountain. It is the garden of the Song that the beloved personifies:
> «Fountain of the garden, spring of living water» (Song 4:13a.15a).
In front of the central window that introduces eastern light into the corridor painting, there is no longer the emblem of the dove on which the ritual celebration of the panel for the silver chest insists.
Neither the silent adoration that hovers in the mysterious contemplation of the convent cell. In front of this centrality, which is precious in the reminiscences of the Canticle, the wine cell, and Catherine of Siena’s blood cell and self-knowledge cell, Friar John Angelic places Mary simply sitting on a bench in the refectory, not on the throne where he had placed her in Cortona or Montecarlo, almost with a complete elevation, since she is facing Gabriel and beyond him, dressed in a tunic of light and a cloak of shadow, dreamy eyes as always, lips slightly touching the Angel, between the room and us.
In the convent cell, Mary is kneeling on a small bench. Her entire body is absorbed by the pink garments highlighted by light from the East.
Here we have the utmost abstraction and intimacy. The archway lines are reduced to the minimum and bring us into the scene. Space and proportion are entrusted to a very sensitive nuance, almost a face. The Archangel seems to rise from the earth, simple and imposing, with a collected gesture and a reverent attitude. Mary is on her knees, without a mantle, surprised in prayer, with a book partially open in her hand, which may signify the memory of prophecies: written in an impalpable pink that makes her seem transparent, she is attentive, more to the Angel’s words than to the Spirit’s subsequent intervention and the fulfillment of the mystery. Indeed, this is the moment of the Word’s incarnation: “Be it done.” The soft curve of the arches connects the figures above and expresses their dialogue: message and listening, proposal and acceptance.
The wonder of this painting lies in the absolute sobriety of the whole, which corresponds to renouncing any description in the Gospel account: the lightness of color of both characters is accompanied by the dawning of the floor and plaster, over which the affection-arcs drawn as shadows by morning light coming from outside.
The Comment on the Angelic Salutation by Thomas Aquinas (1.1.2) describes the scene thus: «Maria is also full of grace in the sense that the grace of her soul overflows into her body […] so that her flesh conceived the Son of God. According to Hugo of Saint Victor, the love of the Holy Spirit burned so intensely in her heart as to perform wonders in her flesh to such an extent that God-Man was born.»
## The Adoration of the Incarnation in Franciscan and Angelic Art
The use of adoring the Incarnation of the Lord is suggested by the *Meditationes Vitae Christi* of Pseudo-Bonaventura, a Franciscan text, and Saint Angelic continues this theme both in the panel depicting the Announcement and in the Nativity scene.
In the silver cabinet made for the Most Holy Annunziata of the Servants of Mary in Florence, there is a persistent emphasis on Chapter 4 of the Song of Songs:
“‘How beautiful you are, my love, how beautiful! Your eyes are doves among your tresses; your lips are like a thread of purple, your mouth is filled with grace… You are all beautiful, my love, without blemish. … Heart, my sister, bride, you have captured my heart with a single glance’” (Song of Songs 4:1-3, 7-9).
By placing her on her knees before the altar, not on a bench that she appears to ignore, Brother John highlights the event between earth and heaven, between Mary and the Spirit who, in the central fountain, comes down to her. She is dressed in ceremonial attire, celebrating the sacred wedding, with a red tunic and blue mantle that, identical to the habit of the Incarnate Word, will only change in subsequent panels following Resurrection, where she joins her Lord’s glory, analogously to what happens to Jesus during Transfiguration, Washing of Feet, the Way of the Cross, Resurrection, or when Mary shares in her glory.
**Outdoor Variant:** The architecture opens onto a garden in the background, known as the *Hortus conclusus*, symbolizing Mary’s virginity at conception and birth. Here too is present the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove among the cypresses’ points. The Angel gestures towards heaven with his hand, while inscriptions above and below the scene recount respectively the prophecy of Isaiah and the Angel’s announcement. In the Announcement scene, with a central perspective texture, Mary is gathered in prayer in a luminosely lit atrium that evokes the *Hortus conclusus*, an anthology of Marian symbols. The cypresses visible behind Mary allude to those on Mount Zion:
“I grew as tall as the cypress trees on Mount Hermon” (Sirach 24:13-17).
The open balustrade towards the landscape in the background refers to Mary as the *porta coeli* (gate of heaven). Mary receives the Angel’s word with thoughtful and attentive prudence, as he gestures to point up to heaven. The setting, rich in architectural references alluding to the new temple where God will dwell with humanity, is situated on an open loft overlooking the sky and horizon, to the morning light that foreshadows noon’s glory. The traditional book resting on a tribune is replaced by leaves recounting in Latin the prophecy of Isaiah and the Angel’s words: “Behold, you shall conceive and give birth to a son, whom you are to call Jesus” (Luke 1:26-38).
In the corridor where Gabriel entered through an arch that made him bow, the architectural space of humanity would not contain either the Angel or Mary who, in the three paintings, have larger-than-natural proportions, and now intensively extends towards the Virgin in a pause of an impossible static, holding iris-shaped wings on his elaborate tunic fringed at the cuffs and chest, embroidered at the bottom and on the sleeves, with a face in pure profile, more for us than for her.
In the panel he is also depicted in adoration on his knees. The suggestion comes from the Franciscan reverence due to every creature to the Word who became flesh in Mary.
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