On the first day in Belgium, I visited the city of Brussels, where my group and I took a look inside the Musee Oldmasters museum. In the museum, they had so many pieces of art made in the 16th and 17th century. One of those pieces being the Assumtion of the Virgin made by Peter Paul Rubens. This painting was extremely beautiful to look at and gave me this great feeling of awe. I say that not only because the painting was in great detail, but also because it was probably 10 times my size. When I stood next to it, not only did I felt extremely tiny, but I also felt like Rubens painted it this way so we could understand the greater meaning of the painting.

If you take a closer look at the painting, you will see some people closing what looks like a tomb, but the tomb is not completely closed. You will see the expression of some of the people’s faces to be that of shock, bewilderment, and surprise. This is because there is a belief in Christianity that when the Virgin Mary died, her body did not stay on earth. Instead, she was taken completely, body and all, back to heaven with God. And because her body was no longer in the tomb, that caused the people to have the expressions on their face to be that of surprise.

This painting is also painted in bright colors to emphasize the happiness of the Virgin going back to be with the Lord. If you look closely at the Virgin and the angels, they are all surrounded by light and the Virgin is outstretching her hands as if she is going to embrace someone. The angels are also happy because they know the Virgin is good and that they are bringing her to heaven.

While I did not do this painting for my freshman seminar project, it was still nice to be able to behold it and see it in person!