The madonnas of Baltimore

When arriving to Baltimore by train, many visitors make straight for the waterfront, where an aquarium and crab restaurants await. This is a mistake.

Their first stop in that fine, much-maligned city should be the Walters Art Museum. It lies half-way between the Amtrak station and the Inner Harbor, a 15-minute walk from each.

The museum is strong on the medieval period and holds an excellent collection of 19th-century French masters. But the section that impressed me most was the one devoted to Renaissance madonnas.

When you seen the madonnas gathered in a single room, you are struck by the expression on their faces. Instead of basking in maternal love, Mary has a weary look as she gazes on newborn Jesus. There’s nothing like giving birth to God to induce post-partum depression.

But the most stunning madonna of all is the one shown at the top of this post. It is not from Renaissance Italy, but inspired by 1850s America. On it, Madonna does not look sad: she is clearly angry.

And what is that “A” on her breast? She can’t be an Oakland baseball fan (true, that could explain the pissed-off look on her face, but the painting was made long before the city was established — let alone the franchise.)

As you read the title of the painting, all becomes clear: “The Scarlet Letter.” This is Hester Prynne, the heroine of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel of the same name. Hester was publicly disgraced and condemned to wear a red “A” for adultery. The tortured minister who fathered her child, and whose guilty harangues add to her own torment, appears in the background along with Hester’s husband.

The painter was actually French — a guy called Hugues Merle. But the representation of a contemporary American adulteress as an irate madonna wonderfully captures the spirit of Hawthorne’s masterpiece.

Below are other notable works displayed in the Walters museum:

• a statue of a weary Joseph (it’s not easy being God’s stepfather either) from 15th-century Tuscany:

• Trophime Bigot’s “Judith decapitating Holofernes” (1640) — great chiaroscuro:

• “The Ideal City” by Fra Carnevale (c.1480): a utopian urban landscape that could have graced the cover any of the best 1970s prog-rock albums:

• An anonymous 17th-century bronze of Prometheus from Umbria: