Deposition from the Cross

A deposition without a deposition. Pontormo painted Christ's body being lowered — but there is no cross in the frame, no ladder, no landscape, no ground beneath the figures' feet. Just ten twisting bodies in acid pinks and cold blues, floating in an ambiguous space. It is one of the most radical religious paintings of the sixteenth century, and it sits in a chapel in Florence that most tourists walk past. Pontormo was mourning his mentor Andrea del Sarto, who had just died. The figures have nowhere to stand. Now at Santa Felicita, Florence @santafelicitafirenze