This painting was executed for the Convento de la Merced Calzada monastery in the artist's native city of Seville. Murillo painted the image of the Virgin Mary many times. In his works the Mother of God is a Spanish beauty with burning eyes. In the Hermitage Rest on the Flight into Egypt, a gracious, attractive Madonna tenderly watches over the sleeping Christ. Two little angels try to get closer - the artist very precisely conveys the distinctive character of childish behaviour, something that was a new feature in 17th-century European painting. The ability to combine the concrete with the poetic and sublime was a characteristic feature of Murillo's talent. Everything in this painting is harmonious: the correlation of the figures and the landscape, the softness of the flowing lines, the combination of a range of reddish-brown and golden colours with the silvery hues of the landscape.
This was the first Murillo to reach St Petersburg. It was acquired in 1768, from the collection of Gaignat, a former secretary to Louis XV, with the Encyclopedist Denis Diderot acting as intermediary. At that time the works of Murillo were very popular in Europe, as well as in the artist’s lifetime.