Detail of "Madonna Sewing" (Madonna del Cucito)

The fresco shows the unusual image of a young Mary, in a red dress, her long hair held up by a diadem, bending over her lap and intent on sewing a white cloth. A scene that is only apparently intimate and domestic, as revealed by the Angels and the cartouches of the little angels that allude to the predestination of Mary as the mother of Christ and to her Immaculate Conception. An image that is revealed only by entering the presbytery of the 'private' chapel of Paul V, taken from a small 'bed' painting that the Reni had donated to the pontiff in 1606.