La Maddalena Penitente, is a marble work by Antonio Canova, made between 1794 and 1796.
It was the first work of the artist to reach Paris, received with great enthusiasm by the audience of the 1808 Salon.
The artist wanted to shape the entire work, passing from the smoothness of the Magdalene’s body to the barely sketched treatment of the base on which it is placed, highlighting the contrast between a beautiful body, expression of life and sensuality, to its annihilation in the awareness of sins and the invocation for forgiveness.
