Description

Madonna Etching by P. Buckley Moss

Introduction

Madonna Etching by P. Buckley Moss is an artist-signed, numbered limited-edition etching centered on one of Western art’s enduring subjects: a mother holding an infant. Moss places the pair inside an oval field of blue, pink, lavender, and gray, surrounding them with sweeping ribbon-like contours that make the composition feel enclosed and intimate.

Canada Goose Gallery’s approved inventory identifies Madonna Etching as Product ID 9772, currently priced at $800, and verifies it as an Artist Signed, Etching, Limited Edition, Numbered Edition work categorized under Children and Women.

The supplied gallery record dates the work to 1987 and identifies the available impression as 61/99, titled and signed “61/99 – Madonna – P Buckley Moss 87.”

Story Behind the Artwork

The relationship between the two figures is communicated through posture before any religious interpretation is considered.

The mother bends toward the infant, bringing her face close to the child while supporting the small wrapped body in her arms. The baby looks outward from a pink covering, creating a quiet contrast between the mother’s inward attention and the infant’s visible face.

Around them, Moss develops a network of broad, curling lines. These forms echo the curves of the mother’s clothing, head covering, arms, and the infant’s blanket, visually binding the figures to their surroundings.

The entire scene is contained within a broad oval against a dark rectangular background. That enclosure gives the image an almost medallion-like quality and separates the intimate mother-and-child scene from everything outside it.

Symbols & Meaning

The title Madonna places this mother-and-child image within a long Christian artistic tradition associated with Mary and the infant Jesus.

For centuries, artists have approached the Madonna and Child not only as sacred figures but also through recognizable human gestures: holding, supporting, embracing, nursing, touching, and exchanging glances. This combination of sacred subject and maternal intimacy helped make the Madonna and Child one of the most persistent subjects in Western Christian art.

Within Moss’s composition, the surrounding oval and flowing lines can visually suggest enclosure, unity, or embrace, but no supplied artist statement establishes that Moss specifically intended the oval to symbolize eternity or divine protection.

Artistic Details

Madonna Etching depends strongly on curving line and repeated shape.

The mother’s bent head, shoulder, arm, and garment establish one series of curves. The infant’s wrapped body creates another. Those contours are then repeated and enlarged throughout the blue-gray surrounding field.

Pink and lavender dominate the mother’s clothing and head covering, while the infant is wrapped in a related pink tone. These warmer colors stand forward against the cooler blue and gray background.

The dark rectangular exterior provides another level of contrast. Instead of allowing the colored field to run to the edge, Moss contains the figures within an oval, emphasizing the difference between the intimate interior image and its dark surroundings.

The supplied dimensions also illustrate an important feature of printmaking: the 11-3/4 x 14-7/16-inch plate image occupies only part of the larger 20-7/16 x 22-7/8-inch sheet of paper.

Featured Master Collections

Primary Master Collection: Faith That Endures

The Madonna title and traditional mother-and-child sacred subject provide a strong editorial connection to Faith That Endures, CGG’s Master Collection devoted to faith expressed through subjects such as sacred traditions, worship, grace, Christmas, and quiet reflection.

This assignment is interpretive rather than an exact-title curator placement. The retrieved CGG materials do not explicitly list Madonna Etching among the collection’s representative works.

Supporting Master Collection: Family & Legacy

CGG independently categorizes this particular etching under Women and Children, while the visible composition centers the physical relationship between a mother and infant. This supports a secondary editorial connection to family bonds and generational relationships.

Decorating Ideas

The larger paper size gives Madonna Etching enough visual presence for a bedroom, family room, reading area, nursery, prayer or reflection space, chapel, or collected gallery wall.

Its muted blue-gray, lavender, rose, and pink palette can work with traditional interiors as well as softer contemporary spaces. Archival matting can preserve the distinction between the printed plate area and the larger sheet while giving the oval composition room to breathe.

Gift Ideas

The combination of maternal and sacred imagery makes Madonna Etching relevant for Mother’s Day, a baptism, or the arrival of a child.

It may also interest collectors exploring Moss through either traditional printmaking or mother-and-child subjects rather than through a single product category.

About the Edition

Artist: P. Buckley Moss
Title: Madonna Etching
Product ID: 9772
Year: 1987
Medium: Etching
Edition type: Artist-signed, limited numbered edition
Available impression: 61/99 
Numbered edition: 99 
Artist’s proofs: Not supplied
Plate size: 11-3/4 x 14-7/16 inches
Paper size: 20-7/16 x 22-7/8 inches
Orientation: Horizontal
Signature/title: “61/99 – Madonna – P Buckley Moss 87” — supplied information
Current CGG price: $800
Condition: New, mint; never previously owned

CGG independently verifies Product ID 9772, the $800 current price, and its Artist Signed / Etching / Limited Edition / Numbered Edition classifications.

🎨 Fun Fact:

The Madonna and Child was not always portrayed as the tender mother-and-baby scene familiar from later Western art. Some early Christian and Byzantine examples emphasized Mary’s sacred status through formal, frontal poses, while later medieval and Renaissance artists increasingly explored affectionate gestures between mother and child. Art historians sometimes use the Greek term Eleousa, meaning “tenderness” or “mercy,” for an icon type in which the Christ Child presses close to Mary’s cheek. That history makes physical closeness itself an important part of how artists have shaped the Madonna-and-Child tradition across centuries.

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🖼️ Collector’s Insight:

Madonna Etching is distinguished by the way Moss integrates the mother and infant into the design surrounding them. The curving blue-gray forms do not function as a conventional room, landscape, or architectural background; instead, they repeat the contours of the figures until the entire oval feels interconnected. The available impression is supplied as 61/99, while CGG independently verifies the work as artist signed, numbered, limited, and etched. For collectors comparing Moss etchings, it also offers a notable contrast with Angel Boy Etching: both use an enclosed figure against a dark exterior, but Madonna relies on interlocking curves and a mother-child relationship rather than the radiating tonal field of the angel composition.

Why Buy from Canada Goose Gallery

Canada Goose Gallery’s approved inventory identifies Madonna Etching as Product ID 9772, an artist-signed, limited, numbered P. Buckley Moss etching currently priced at $800.

CGG also inventories several related Moss works across both mother-and-child subjects and the etching medium, allowing collectors to compare subject, composition, and printmaking approach.

Continue Exploring

For a direct mother-and-child comparison, CGG verifies Mother and Child Etching — $1,600, Product ID 29289, as another artist-signed, numbered limited-edition etching categorized under Children and Women.

• Loving Touch Etching — $280, Product ID 9767, provides another verified Children / Women etching comparison.
• Newborn Etching — $950, Product ID 19891, is another verified artist-signed, numbered etching categorized under Children and Women.

Verified ornament examples:

• Madonna Ornament — direct subject connection.
• Blue Madonna Ornament — another verified Madonna-themed CGG destination.
• A Child Is Born Ornament
• And There Were Angels Ornament
• Angelic Adoration Ornament

Suggested Categories & Subjects:

• P. Buckley Moss Etchings
• P. Buckley Moss Ornaments
• Babies
• Children

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“Mother and child, joined by line and color.”