Crèche or Nativity?

I have always called them nativity scenes, but the Loyola Museum of Art says that a  three-dimensional nativity scene is called a crèche.  A book about the Neapolitan crèche at the Art Institute of Chicago refers to the whole scene as a crèche and the section with Joseph, Mary, and Jesus as the nativity. And a Google search for crèche vs. nativity leads one to the fact that originally crèche just referred to the manger. Whatever you call them, I have a collection of them. We added two new ones this year. The first one came from Vase and Vessel at the Andersonville Insidewalk Sale last March. It is from Guatemala and was marked down to $5.00, so we couldn’t resist.

The second one was part of an outside Sidewalk Sale this summer, which technically we were a week late for, but inexplicably it was still at the table outside Amazwi when we got to Saugatuck a week later. Inexplicable because it is beautiful but also because it was 80% off (originally $45.00). It is from Mozambique, and I knew as soon as I saw it that it would be our Advent Calendar Nativity this year. I wrapped and tied baby Jesus to the ring for the 24th and snuck Mary and Joseph onto the top of the china cabinet at night on the 23rd.

As with all my collections, the fascination is in seeing how different artists interpret the same subject.

I had lots of opportunities to see other artist interpretations this year starting with the Neapolitan crèche at the Art Institute of Chicago.

This massive crèche is divided into three major scenes, the Nativity, the Announcement to the Shepherds, and the Taverna or inn. There are over 200 crèche figures crafted by different 18th-century artists arranged in a traditional staging resembling the old city center of Naples and placed in a 19th century cabinet topped by an 18th-century carved and gilded cornice, which was originally part of an organ.

LUMA, the Loyola Museum of Art, brought back their full crèche exhibit this year, which featured many we hadn’t seen before. I took pictures of some of them (it was hard not to take pictures of all of them!) but neglected to note the countries of origins and the artist’s names if known. Starting with the most unique one, here are a few of my favorites:

When we went to the Swedish American Museum to see the bonader – large painted textiles produced by folk artists in Sweden in the mid 18th to early 19th century and hung in homes during the Christmas season, we found another crèche in the lobby of the museum made of straw.

One of the bonader pieces was a nativity scene as well.

Both of these pictures are a bit hard to decipher since both are behind glass and reflecting Christmas lights, but I couldn’t help but notice that the crèche looks like it is being displayed in an aquarium and the baby Jesus on the bonader looks a bit like a fish in an aquarium!