# Charity

**Guido Reni** (Italian, 1575–1642)  
ca. 1630  
Oil on canvas  
54 x 41 3/4 in. (137.2 x 106 cm)

Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1974.348. [The museum's record](https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/437422).

## About this work

A young woman nurses an infant while other children gather around her, the traditional personification of Charity, greatest of the three theological virtues. Guido Reni, the most admired painter in seventeenth-century Bologna, gives her the idealised beauty and luminous, porcelain-like skin for which he was celebrated across Europe. The soft, harmonious colour and graceful arrangement of the figures were meant to move the viewer through beauty rather than drama.

_Written by Ochre Editions._

Guido Reni painted this in about 1630, aged about 50. It is now at The Met in New York.

### How it was made

- **Oil paint.** Pigment ground in a drying oil, usually linseed. It dries slowly, so painters could blend on the canvas, build up thin translucent glazes, and rework a picture over weeks. Canvas replaced wooden panels in the 1500s because it is lighter and can be rolled.

### [Guido Reni](https://www.ochreeditions.com/artists/guido-reni)

Italian, 1575–1642; born in Bologna; died in Bologna

Reni trained in Bologna, first with Denys Calvaert and then at the Carracci academy, and spent the early 1600s in Rome, where his fresco Aurora won wide fame. Returning to Bologna, he ran a large studio and became the most admired painter of his generation, prized for idealised figures, cool, clear colour and graceful movement. His late works, such as Salome with the Head of Saint John the Baptist, are freer in handling and paler in tone.

_Written by Ochre Editions._

## Facts

- Type: Paintings
- The artist was about 50
- Real size: about 54 × 42 in (137 × 106 cm). The original is larger than our largest print, 20 × 30 in, so every print is a reduction.
- Century: 17th century
- Subjects: Children, Women, Allegory, Nursing
- Colour: brown
- Rights: public domain (CC0 1.0); free to use for any purpose.

## Get it

- Free download, full resolution: https://img.ochreeditions.com/m/1143.jpg?dl=1
- Image: https://img.ochreeditions.com/a/1143/1920.jpg
- Giclée reproduction on Hahnemühle Photo Rag: 8 × 10 in $28; 11 × 14 in $38; 12 × 16 in $42; 16 × 20 in $56; 18 × 24 in $68; 20 × 30 in $86
- Framed reproduction: 8 × 10 in $78; 11 × 14 in $98; 12 × 16 in $108; 16 × 20 in $138; 18 × 24 in $164; 20 × 30 in $208
- Canvas reproduction: 8 × 10 in $58; 11 × 14 in $72; 12 × 16 in $79; 16 × 20 in $98; 18 × 24 in $118
- Print-ready file: 8 × 10 in $2; 11 × 14 in $2; 12 × 16 in $3; 16 × 20 in $3; 18 × 24 in $3; 20 × 30 in $5

Sizes stop where the museum's file would print below 150 pixels per inch. Everything sold is a reproduction, made to order. [Order a print](https://www.ochreeditions.com/art/charity-met-437422).