The treatment of the subject follows the standard conventions of the time. The Virgin is depicted in a homespun way which was the Protestant preference as opposed to the Catholic tendency towards idealisation. Yet Bloemaert was himself a Catholic. This picture is unusual because it is a later work by an artist, whose mature style was the acme of Dutch mannerism. The artist has abandoned his high colour scheme and agitated movement in favour of a much calmer and more classicising approach. The picture was painted at precisely the moment when Bloemaert’s Utrecht colleagues Honthorst and Ter Brugghen (qq.v.) were still painting in a strongly Caravaggesque style. Along with the other version on loan to Toronto, this is the only known treatment of this subject by the artist.

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