Our Lady of Sorrows (The first sorrow)

The representation of Our Lady of Sorrows is the one where the heart of the Virgin Mary is shown as pierced by a sword, in relation to the prophecy of Simeon in the Temple of Jerusalem, who foresaw the sorrow that would befall the mother of Christ.
This 18th century painting on wood of Our Lady of Sorrows is painted in the style of the late 17th century and seeks to dramatically highlight the figure of the Virgin, who is swathed in drapery. The crescent moon, which is usually found in the depictions of the Immaculate Conception, lies at her feet. The composition emanates a certain naïve Baroque quality in the way in which it represents the Virgin sitting on the piled-up stones of calvary with her hands clasped to her breast and an air of suffering. The image is framed with hanging ribbons and flowers in loud colours. Such motifs had appeared in the mid-17th century, in the works of the Portuguese painter Josefa de Obidos, who adopted floral decoration from the imposing still-lifes produced in Spain. When such motifs found their way to the Orient, the floral frame began to be enriched with long, wide, intensely coloured striped ribbons, giving the composition better emphasis.