Mary Magdalen Exalted by Angels

The Madeleine, with its forty-four sculptors, was one of the most important sculpture workshops of the 1830s in Paris. Thirty-four statues adorn the external peristyle, while the interior altars surmounted by groups or statues replace the cenotaphs of the royal family originally envisaged by Louis XVIII and lead one’s gaze towards the high altar crowned by a somewhat theatrical group by Marchetti: Mary Magdalene carried up to heaven by two angels whose wings frame the large curvilinear composition.