The painting depicts a moment of rest of the Holy Family during their return from Egypt and not the more traditional escape of Mary and Joseph with infant Jesus to escape Herod’s persecutions. This is confirmed by the age of Jesus, who is no longer a newborn baby, and by the description of the Gospel of Matthew, depicted by Correggio. In fact, during the journey of return from Egypt, the Holy family stopped in the desert because they were hungry. A palm tree bent down and made water flow from its roots to provide the family and in return, angels brought a branch of the tree to Heaven. The works is known by the name Madonna della Scodella, for the bowl in the hands of the Virgin, which she is handing to an angel, who pours water into it for her to give it to her son. It is the water that emerged from the miraculous spring, which appeared in the middle of the desert.

The painting, therefore, portrays the Holy Family in a moment of great intimacy, with young Mary holding the Child in her arms, while Joseph is picking dates from the palm tree to feed the son. Behind him an angel is tying a donkey to a tree, while a chorus of angels, similar to those the artist painted in the cathedral of Parma in the same years, fly over soft clouds and carry the palm branch in Paradise. A warm light surrounds the figures with sweet features and soft bodies, underlining the family’s tender affection and the simple humanity of the holy characters with spontaneous gestures and tender and natural expressions. This type of painting, which represents the feelings and the intimacy of the Holy Family, was particularly effective, because it favored the identification of the faithful with the miraculous episode.

The work was commissioned to the artist before October 1524 by the confraternity of Pia Unione di San Giuseppe for the chapel in the church of San Sepolcro in Parma, where it was placed in June 1530. This would also explain the choice to depict the return from Egypt, where Joseph seems to have a more prominent role. This is confirmed by his figure, who dominates the diagonal composition, where the child’s hand is in the center, taking food from his loving father. The composition should be read from right to left to follow the sequence of events: from the angel who ties the donkey on the far right to Mary who receives the water in the bowl on the far left, through Joseph who collects the dates from the palm and then gives them to his son.

The gilded and carved wooden altarpiece that frames the painting is embellished with an inscription and it was made by Marcantonio Zucchi and designed by Correggio. During the Napoleonic suppression the painting was taken to Paris in 1796, and then returned to the collection of Pinacoteca Nazionale twenty years later, in 1816.

The life of Antonio Allegri, known as Correggio, was not well documented and little is known about his movements. It is known that he was born in Correggio, a town near Parma, from where he took his name of which the artist is best known and where he probably had his early artistic education with his uncle and cousin. It also known that he visited Mantua, where he perhaps met old Andrea Mantegna at the Gonzaga court, and where he probably saw the famous Camera degli Sposi in Palazzo Ducale and its ceiling painted by Mantegna, characterized by the illusionistic perspective, that will influence Correggio’s representation of space.

In fact, the artist’s first works are influenced by Mantegna also for their greater harshness and rigidity, in the garments for example, compared to his later paintings which were influenced by Leonardo’s works as well, especially by his sfumato effect, and Raphael, whose works Correggio studied during a trip to Rome from whom he learned the soft sweetness of forms that would become a typical feature in his painting.

In 1520 the artist, who had returned to Parma, began the decoration of Camera della Badessa in the monastery of San Paolo. The fresco paintings, commissioned by abbess Giovanna di Piacenza, showed how the artist had assimilated the decorative examples of Raphael in Rome, taking inspiration from Loggia di Psiche, but above all the artist’s ability to represent illusionistic perspective of space in the vault decorated with a fake pergola that opens to the sky, with similar illustionistic effects as in Camera degli Sposi of Mantegna.

The decoration of Camera della Badessa brought Correggio success and important commissions such as the frescoes of the dome of the church of San Giovanni Evangelist, which he made between 1520 and 1524, and of the cathedral of Parma, both characterized by spectacular perspective effects with surprising and daring elements, as well as figures with flowing clothes that move lightly in the air with spectacular spirals.

Correggio was a highly sought-after painter for religious altarpieces, such as the famous Madonna of St. Jerome at the National Gallery of Parma (1528), the Adoration of the Shepherds, made between 1525 and 1530, preserved today at the Gemälde Galerie of Dresden. The artist also dedicated himself to profane themes, such as the two Allegories of Vice and Virtue for the Studiolo of Isabella d’Este from 1531, and the series of lovers of Jupiter (Danae, Leda and the Swan, Jupiter and Io) for her son, Federico II Gonzaga, painted in the thirties of the century.
Correggio died suddenly in his hometown on March 5, 1534.

The construction of Palazzo della Pilotta started in 1583 for the order of the duke of Parma and Piacenza, Ottavio Farnese, who entrusted the task to architect Francesco Paciotto from Urbino. The name Pilotta derives from the game pelota, played by Spanish soldiers in the courtyard of Guazzatoio.

Today, the building holds the museum of archeology, national gallery, Palatine library, Farnese theater, and the Bodonian museum as well as the Accademia Nazionale di Belle Arti, the artistic lyceum of Paolo Toschi, the Department of Cultural Heritage and Performing Arts of the University of Parma.

After the extinction of the Farnese dynasty their collection was moved to Naples by Charles III of Spain in 1734. Pilotta remained without its artistic treasures until the duke Philip of Spain arrived in Parma in 1749. The son of the king of Spain and his wife Louise Elizabeth, the favorite daughter of the king Louis XV of France. At this occasion, Pilotta became a cultural center, a real symbol of the enlightenment and the French politics. Accademia di Belle Arti was founded in 1757 and a new artistic collection was created, from which will originate the Galleria Nazionale. The Palatina library (1769) and archaeological museum (1769) were added to the complex.

During the years of the restoration, under the duchy of Marie Louise of Austria (1816-1847) the cultural institutions of the Pilotta underwent considerable transformations. The halls of representation of the court were rearranged and the façade of the Palazzo was remade between 1833 and 1834, creating its elegant neoclassical character. Th task was entrusted to the architect Nicola Bettoli and the aim was to giver greater dignity to the ducal residence.

During the 1944 bombardments the building was severely damaged and from this point began a series of restoring interventions renovating the interiors, which became suitable to host the Galleria Nazionale, starting from 1991. The collection includes La Scapiliata by Leonardo da Vinci, the Turkish Slave and the Mystical Marriage of St. Catherine by Parmigianino, Correggio’s Madonna of St. Jerome and the Lamentation Over the Dead Christ, Guercino’s Susanna and the Elders and a view by Canaletto.