Lemoyne Annunciation returns to Winchester College
February 16 2022
Picture: Winchester College
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
News from Hampshire that François Lemoyne’s Annunciation (1727) has returned to Winchester College after a ten-year loan to the National Gallery in London.
According to the school's website:
The Annunciation had been at the College since 1729 and originally hung above the altar in Chapel. It was a gift from John Burton, headmaster of Winchester from 1724 to 1766. The painting illustrates a passage in St Luke’s Gospel, where the archangel Gabriel announces to Mary that she will give birth to Jesus. This subject was particularly appropriate for Winchester College, which is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, but the choice of a Catholic artist was unusual at the time. Lemoyne’s work is probably the earliest example, after the Reformation, of a foreign painter being commissioned to produce an altarpiece for an English church.
Visitors will be able to see the picture in the school's museum which is open from 2pm- 4pm every afternoon.
