Christ and the Samaritan Woman at the Well, 17th Century Oil on Canvas, Framed Old Master Painting

Christ sits on the low stone kerb of the well at the left, in a red robe and a deep blue green mantle, barefoot, his right hand raised in the gesture of speech. The Samaritan woman stands facing him in a pale grey gown and a heavy ochre mantle, a copper bucket hanging from her right hand and the well rope still held in her left. Between them the flat stone of the kerb runs across the picture, empty, and it is that emptiness that carries the whole exchange.

Behind them the landscape opens, with a dark tree closing the upper left, blue hills in the far distance and a pale clouded sky. On the right stands the town of Sychar in warm stone, with an arch at its foot, and two small figures are walking towards it. Those are the disciples, returning from the city as the Gospel describes, and putting them there is the detail that shows a painter who knew the text rather than merely the scene.

The meeting at the well, from the fourth chapter of the Gospel of John, was among the most painted of all New Testament subjects in the seventeenth century, and one of the very few showing Christ alone in conversation with a woman. Painters were drawn to it because it is a scene of dialogue rather than of action, where everything depends on two figures, a stretch of stone between them, and the gestures each makes. The iconography is fixed and easy to read once known. Christ is seated, because the Gospel says he was weary from the journey. The woman stands, and carries the vessel that brought her there. The well lies between them, and the disciples appear in the distance, coming back from the town where they had gone to buy food.

The canvas carries a horizontal tear on the right side and minor paint loss, visible in the photographs, and a mark on the reverse that remains to be identified. It is presented in a period ebonised frame with gilt scrollwork at the corners and star motifs at the centres, with some gaps in the surface.