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Triptych by Peter Paul Rubens

The Elevation of the Cross (also called The Raising of the Cross) is the name of two paintings, a very large triptych in oil on panel and a much smaller oil on paper painting. Cornelis van der Geest, a wealthy merchant and churchwarden of the Catholic Church of St. Walburga, secured this commission for Rubens and funded the majority of the project. This height was unusual for an altarpiece indicating its important presence in St. Walburga.

This altarpiece is an early attempt by Ruben's to employ the intensity of the Baroque style. The three panels together work harmoniously, creating a continuous scene. Rubens contrasts the uniqueness of Christ's plea for forgiveness with quotations from ancient depictions of the vengeance of the gods (Laocoon, Niobids, Farnese Bull). The smaller painting is unique from the original, however, with the addition of color accents throughout the composition.

The Church of Saint Walburga was closed after French Revolutionary armies occupied Antwerp, and later demolished. The painting was taken to Paris in 1794, along with Peter Paul Rubens's The Descent from the Cross, to Paris. The paintings were returned to Antwerp at the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815, but since the Catholic Church of St. Walburga had been destroyed, they were placed in the Cathedral of Our Lady in Antwerp instead. The Elevation of The Cross, along with The Descent From The Cross, was stolen again in 1914 by the Imperial German Army and taken to the Berlin Palace in Berlin, where they remained until after the Armistice of November 11, 1918 when they were returned to the Cathedral.