December 8

Festa della Immacolata Concezione

Today December 8 is the feast of the Immaculate Conception, which is a public holiday in Italy and seen as the beginning of the Christmas holiday season. Contrary to popular belief, it celebrates the day on which the Virgin Mary was conceived by her parents Saint Anne and Saint Joachim. The feast of Mary’s birthday is accordingly celebrated nine months later on September 8.

To celebrate, here is a painting by Jacopo Tintoretto of Subject Saint Zachariah, Saint Anne, Saint Joseph, Saint Catherine of Alexandria and Saint Francis of Assisi with the Virgin Mary and Jesus. It’s one of the only paintings by Tintoretto to show Saint Anne, the Virgin Mary’s mother. She is the older lady to the Virgin’s left.

Painted in about 1540, when Tintoretto was achieving his first successes, this painting is part of the R. Field Collection, Greenacres, Beverly Hills, California.