page_title: Angels in art
section_title: Renaissance art
hierarchical_section_title: Angels in art / Christian art / Renaissance art
context_page_description: Angels have appeared in works of art since early Christian art, and they have been a popular subject for Byzantine and European paintings and sculpture.
  Angels are usually intended, in both Christian and Islamic art, to be beautiful, though several depictions go for more awesome or frightening attributes, notably in the depiction of the living creatures, ophanim and cherubim; As a matter of theology, they are spiritual beings who do not eat or excrete and are genderless. Many angels in art may appear to the modern eye to be gendered as either male or female by their dress or actions, but until the 19th century, even the most female looking will normally lack breasts, and the figures should normally be considered as genderless. In 19th-century art, especially funerary art, this traditional convention is sometimes abandoned.
context_section_description: The classical erotes or putto re-appeared in art during the Italian Renaissance in both religious and mythological art, and is often known in English as a cherub, the singular of cherubim, actually one of the higher ranks in the Christian angelic hierarchy.  They normally appear in groups and are generally given wings in religious art, and are sometimes represented as just a winged head.  They generally are just in attendance, except that they may be amusing Christ or John the Baptist as infants in scenes of the Holy Family.
caption: Fra Angelico, The Annunciation, 1437–46
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