Marie-madeleine, or the eternal renewal of the gaze
The slanting light of an autumn afternoon filters through the stained glass of the Basilica of Sainte-Marie-Madeleine in Vézelay. On the central portal, carved from the golden stone of the twelfth century, a woman with unbound hair reaches her hands toward the sky. Her features are worn by centuries
By Artedusa
••16 min read
Marie-Madeleine, or the eternal renewal of the gaze
The slanting light of an autumn afternoon filters through the stained glass of the Basilica of Sainte-Marie-Madeleine in Vézelay. On the central portal, carved from the golden stone of the twelfth century, a woman with unbound hair reaches her hands toward the sky. Her features are worn by centuries, but her gesture remains strikingly intense. Who is she? A repentant sinner? A saint in ecstasy? An unrecognized apostle? Tour guides whisper her name as if it were self-evident: Mary Magdalene. Yet this face of stone tells far more than a simple golden legend. It embodies two thousand years of metamorphoses, in which a biblical woman became the mirror of the West’s fears, desires, and hopes.
Imagine for a moment that this figure—one of the most represented in the history of art—was never a prostitute. That the Gospels, those foundational texts, never once mention her past as a courtesan. And that it was a sixth-century pope, Gregory the Great, who sealed her iconographic fate by merging three women into one: Mary of Magdala, the faithful disciple; Mary of Bethany, Martha’s sister; and the anonymous sinner who anointed Christ’s feet. This theological sleight of hand transformed a witness to the Resurrection into the archetype of the fallen woman, then redeemed. And artists, from Giotto to Caravaggio, from Titian to Tracey Emin, would seize this hybrid figure to explore the boundaries between the sacred and the profane, flesh and spirit, shame and redemption.
Today, when you step into a Baroque church or flip through a contemporary art catalog, you still meet her gaze. Sometimes languid under Titian’s brush, sometimes hallucinatory in Georges de La Tour’s canvases, sometimes deconstructed in Kiki Smith’s installations. Mary Magdalene is not a saint like the others. She is a living enigma, a projection surface onto which every era has etched its obsessions. And what if her artistic history were, above all, that of a fertile misunderstanding?
The original sin: when the Church invents a saint
In the beginning, there are the Gospels. Four accounts, four fragmentary portraits. In Luke’s, a “sinful woman”—the text does not specify her identity—washes Jesus’ feet with her tears and dries them with her hair. In John’s, Mary of Magdala, a disciple among others, discovers the empty tomb and encounters the risen Christ. Nothing, absolutely nothing, links these two scenes. Yet in 591, Pope Gregory the Great delivered a homily that would change everything: “This woman whom Luke calls a sinner, and whom John names Mary, we believe to be Mary from whom Mark says seven demons were cast out.” In one sentence, the pontiff created a composite character, a saint with three faces whose legend would spread like wildfire.
Why such an amalgamation? Historians see a pastoral strategy. At a time when the Church sought to consolidate its authority, Mary Magdalene became an ideal propaganda tool. By making her a former prostitute, the clerics offered the faithful an accessible model of redemption. The fall, then grace: a simple, effective narrative that spoke to the masses. Medieval artists immediately embraced this figure. In the illuminations of the Hours of the Virgin, she appears kneeling at Christ’s feet, her long, unbound hair modestly covering her body. The message is clear: even the worst of sinners can be saved. But this image, powerful as it is, is a construct. A theological fiction that would haunt Western art for centuries.
Take the portal of Vézelay. Dated to the twelfth century, it depicts Mary Magdalene not as a penitent, but as a preacher. Dressed in a simple robe, a book in hand, she seems to harangue an invisible crowd. This iconography, rare for the time, draws on a local legend that the saint evangelized Provence after Christ’s death. Here, no jar of ointments, no tears of repentance. Just a woman on a mission, an apostle among apostles. Yet this “alternative” version would quickly be eclipsed by the Gregorian narrative. In the thirteenth century, Jacobus de Voragine’s Golden Legend definitively enshrined the image of the repentant sinner. And artists, increasingly numerous in depicting the saint, would conform to this new canon.
Flesh and spirit: Mary Magdalene’s body as a battleground
If Mary Magdalene fascinates artists, it is first because she embodies a fundamental tension: that of body and soul. How to represent a woman who is both sensual and saintly? How to reconcile flesh, symbol of sin, and spirit, path to salvation? The answers vary by era, but one constant remains: her body is a contested territory.
In the Middle Ages, representations were codified, almost austere. In illuminated manuscripts, she wears a simple robe, her long hair—traditional attribute of femininity and seduction—modestly covering her body. The message is moralizing: beauty is a trap, repentance a necessity. Yet by the Renaissance, artists began exploring another facet of the saint. Titian, in his Penitent Magdalene of 1533, makes her a creature of troubling sensuality. Clad in a sheer veil, her breasts barely concealed, she lifts her eyes to the sky in a gesture of ecstatic abandon. The painting, commissioned by a Venetian nobleman, is a masterpiece of duplicity. Officially, it is a religious work. But contemporaries also saw it as a celebration of feminine beauty, almost pagan.
This ambiguity reaches its peak with Caravaggio. In his Penitent Magdalene of 1594, the saint is no longer idealized. Seated on a low chair, her hair tangled, her feet dirty, she seems to have just stepped out of a Roman tavern. The realism is so raw that some patrons rejected the painting, deeming it unworthy of a saint. Yet it is precisely this crudeness that gives the work its power. Caravaggio does not depict an icon, but a woman in the midst of transformation. The mirror at her feet, symbol of vanity, reflects an open window—an invitation to turn her gaze toward divine light. The message is subtle: redemption comes through accepting one’s own humanity, with its weaknesses and imperfections.
In the seventeenth century, Georges de La Tour pushes the exploration further. In his Penitent Magdalens, the saint is plunged into near-total darkness, illuminated only by the trembling glow of a candle. The skull on her lap, her hand brushing the flame, she embodies a meditation on life’s fragility. But what strikes is the treatment of light. With La Tour, it does not come from the sky, but from an earthly, almost intimate source. As if divine grace could reveal itself only through the humblest objects: a candle, a mirror, a skull. A revolution in sacred art, where the spiritual nestles in the everyday.
The broken mirror: when artists reinvent the legend
If Mary Magdalene has endured through the centuries, it is also because her story, infinitely malleable, lends itself to all reinterpretations. Each era projects its fantasies, fears, and hopes onto her. And artists, more than anyone, have exploited this plasticity.
In the nineteenth century, the Romantics made her a tragic heroine, a woman torn between passion and duty. In Ary Scheffer’s Mary Magdalene at the Foot of the Cross, she clings to the wood of Calvary like a castaway, her hair undone, her face bathed in tears. The painting, exhibited at the Salon of 1859, caused a stir. Some saw an allegory of feminine suffering; others, a celebration of unconditional faith. But one thing is certain: Scheffer does not paint a saint, but a woman gripped by an almost carnal pain. The boundary between sacred and profane blurs.
This ambiguity culminates with the Pre-Raphaelites. Dante Gabriel Rossetti, in Mary Magdalene at the Door of Simon the Pharisee, makes her an almost pagan figure. Dressed in a blood-red robe, her hair loose over her shoulders, she fixes the viewer with a troubling intensity. The painting, completed in 1858, is a provocation. Rossetti does not depict the repentant sinner, but a self-assured, almost provocative woman. The flowers strewn on the ground—red roses, white lilies—are not religious symbols, but erotic allusions. For the first time, Mary Magdalene is no longer an object of devotion, but a subject in her own right.
In the twentieth century, artists went further, deconstructing the myth to reveal its mechanisms. In 1994, Kiki Smith created Mary Magdalene, a bronze sculpture depicting the saint as a skeletal woman, covered in scars. The body, both vulnerable and powerful, embodies a feminist reappropriation of the biblical narrative. More recently, British artist Tracey Emin explored Mary Magdalene’s figure through installations like My Bed (1998), where the disorder of a bedroom becomes a metaphor for fall and redemption. In these works, the saint is no longer an icon, but an ordinary woman, with her doubts, weaknesses, and strengths.
Yet despite these bold reinterpretations, one question persists: why does Mary Magdalene continue to haunt the Western imagination? Perhaps because she embodies, better than anyone, the paradox of the feminine condition. Sinner or saint, seductress or mystic, she is both the object and the subject of her own story. And it is this duality, this unresolved tension, that makes her an inexhaustible muse.
Provence and the legends: when history blends with myth
If Mary Magdalene became a major figure in Western art, it is also thanks to a story that, though largely fictitious, has left its mark: that of her exile in Provence. According to legend, after Christ’s death, she boarded a boat with Martha, Lazarus, and other disciples—one without sails or rudder, miraculously guided to the coasts of Gaul. There, she lived for thirty years in a cave in the Sainte-Baume massif, nourishing herself only on the divine word, before dying in Saint-Maximin-la-Sainte-Baume, where her body was buried.
This story, popularized in the Middle Ages, is pure invention. No historical source corroborates it. Yet it gave rise to one of Christianity’s most enduring cults. From the twelfth century onward, pilgrims flocked to Provence to venerate her relics. The kings of France, from Louis IX to Louis XIV, made processions to the Sainte-Baume. And artists, of course, seized upon this narrative to create works of rare intensity.
Take José de Ribera’s Magdalene in Ecstasy, painted in 1636. The saint, dressed in a simple robe of sackcloth, lifts her eyes to the sky in a gesture of total abandonment. Her face, bathed in supernatural light, expresses a joy almost painful. Ribera, master of chiaroscuro, plays with contrasts to create an atmosphere both mystical and carnal. The cave where she stands, dark and damp, contrasts with the celestial light that floods her. As if nature itself participated in her transfiguration.
This Provençal legend also inspired quieter, but equally powerful works. In the region’s churches, one finds statues of Mary Magdalene dressed in a red robe—color of martyrdom and passion—her long blond hair flowing. Some representations show her with a book in hand, symbol of her preaching. Others, rarer, depict her as a hermit, her body covered only by her hair, as in medieval accounts. These images, often overlooked, remind us that Mary Magdalene was not always the repentant sinner. In the Provençal imagination, she was also an evangelist, a prophetess, a free woman.
Today, the cave of the Sainte-Baume still attracts thousands of visitors each year. Some come as pilgrims, others as simple tourists. But all are struck by the place’s atmosphere. The light is peculiar, filtered by centuries-old pines. The air is thick with humidity and resin. And on the cave’s walls, ancient graffiti testify to centuries of devotion. “Here, Mary Magdalene prayed,” one can read. A simple phrase, but one that encapsulates the power of legend: to transform an ordinary place into sacred space.
The skull and the jar: decoding the symbols of an icon
If Mary Magdalene became an indispensable figure in art, it is also thanks to a symbolic language of inexhaustible richness. Every object that accompanies her—the skull, the jar of ointments, the mirror, the candle—is a key to understanding her history and metamorphoses.
The skull, first, is undoubtedly her most famous attribute. In medieval and Baroque representations, it embodies the memento mori, a meditation on life’s fleetingness. With Georges de La Tour, it often rests on the saint’s lap, a reminder of her own mortality. But it also carries another, subtler meaning. In some traditions, the skull is Adam’s, symbol of original sin that Christ came to redeem. Mary Magdalene, as the first witness to the Resurrection, thus becomes a figure of universal redemption.
The jar of ointments, meanwhile, refers to the anointing of Christ’s feet. In the Gospels, this scene is a moment of grace, where an anonymous woman—perhaps Mary Magdalene, perhaps another—pours precious perfume over Jesus’ feet. For artists, this object is a godsend. It allows them to play with textures, reflections, materials. With Titian, the jar is of alabaster, translucent, almost alive. With Caravaggio, it is of rough terracotta, realistic. In both cases, it symbolizes both devotion and sensuality. For the ointment, that heady perfume, is also a metaphor for seduction.
The mirror, finally, is one of the most ambivalent symbols. In medieval representations, it embodies vanity, the capital sin that Mary Magdalene overcame. But from the Renaissance onward, it takes on another dimension. With Caravaggio, it reflects an open window, symbol of hope. With La Tour, it is often broken, as if signifying a break with the past. And in some contemporary works, it becomes a tool for reflecting on feminine identity. In 1989, Cindy Sherman created a series of History Portraits where she stages herself as Mary Magdalene, mirror in hand. But instead of reflecting her face, it reveals a distorted, almost monstrous image. A way of questioning the stereotypes that weigh on women, saintly or not.
These objects, far more than mere accessories, are the true heroes of Mary Magdalene’s representations. They tell her story, of course, but also that of the artists who painted them. And if you look closely at a canvas by La Tour or Titian, you will notice that these symbols are never static. They live, they breathe, they engage in dialogue with the viewer. As if, through them, Mary Magdalene continued to speak to us, century after century.
The legacy: when a saint becomes a feminist icon
In the twenty-first century, Mary Magdalene no longer belongs solely to the Church or museums. She has become a figure of popular culture, a symbol of resistance, a feminist icon. And this transformation, as surprising as it may seem, is part of a long history of reappropriations.
It began in the 1970s, with the first feminist research on biblical texts. Historians like Elaine Pagels and Karen King unearthed apocryphal Gospels, such as those of Mary and Philip, where Mary Magdalene appears not as a sinner, but as a privileged disciple, a companion of Christ, even an apostle among apostles. These discoveries, though contested by religious authorities, paved the way for a radical rereading of her story. In 1983, historian Margaret Starbird published The Woman with the Alabaster Jar, a book that scandalized many by suggesting Mary Magdalene was Jesus’ wife. Twenty years later, Dan Brown made her the heroine of The Da Vinci Code, a novel that sold millions and reignited the debate.
But beyond these controversies, it is in contemporary art that Mary Magdalene’s reappropriation takes its full dimension. In 1994, artist Kiki Smith created Mary Magdalene, a bronze sculpture depicting the saint as a skeletal woman covered in scars. The body, both vulnerable and powerful, embodies a feminist vision of redemption: a woman rebuilding herself after being broken. More recently, South African artist Zanele Muholi photographed Black women in poses inspired by traditional representations of Mary Magdalene. The result is striking: these portraits, both sacred and profane, question the norms of beauty and sanctity imposed by the West.
Even cinema has embraced this reinterpretation. In 2018, Garth Davis’s film Mary Magdalene, starring Rooney Mara, offered a radically new vision of the saint. Here, no repentant sinner, but a free woman, a committed disciple, a figure of resistance against a patriarchal world. The film, though criticized for its lack of historical fidelity, had the merit of asking an essential question: what if Mary Magdalene had never been a victim, but a woman who chose her destiny?
This question continues to be posed by contemporary artists, each in their own way. In 2020, French artist ORLAN created La Sainte Marie-Madeleine, a performance in which she stages herself as the saint, dressed in a transparent robe and covered in jewels. The message is clear: sanctity is not a question of purity, but of choice. And Mary Magdalene, more than ever, embodies this freedom.
Epilogue: the gaze that watches us
It is late at night in the silent halls of the Louvre. The guards have turned off the lights, and only a dim lamp illuminates Georges de La Tour’s Penitent Magdalene. The saint, plunged into darkness, seems to watch over the sleeping museum. Her face, half-hidden in shadow, is of an almost unbearable beauty. One would think she is observing us, waiting for something.
Perhaps she waits for us to finally understand her story. Not the one the Church wrote for us, but the one she lived: a story of faith, doubt, passion, and freedom. A story in which a woman, through the centuries, never ceased to reinvent herself.
For Mary Magdalene, more than a saint, is a mirror. A mirror held up to us, reflecting our fears, desires, contradictions. And if she still fascinates us today, it is because she reminds us of a simple truth: the sacred and the profane are not two opposing worlds, but two facets of the same reality. A reality where flesh can be spiritual, where fall can lead to grace, where a sinner can become a saint.
So the next time you meet her gaze in a museum or a church, remember: Mary Magdalene is not a figure frozen in time. She is a woman in motion, a living enigma, a story that has not finished being written. And perhaps, by looking at her, you will finally understand that redemption is not an end, but a beginning.
Marie-madeleine, or the eternal renewal of the gaze | Art History
