The painting depicts Mary in the form of Sarah Bernhardt, an actress who often posed for portraits by Stevens.

[1][2] Alfred Stevens, painter of the mundane life in Paris, met the actress Sarah Bernhardt around 1887.

[2][1] The long hair, the skull - the vanitas symbol par excellence - and the desolate landscape in the background are part of an iconographic tradition that goes back to the Middle Ages.

Typical of the nineteenth century is the manifest sensuality and the melancholic, almost hallucinatory gaze wherewith Mary Magdalene looks at the viewer.

The challenging character of the work, yet completely in keeping with the figure of Mary Magdalene, shocked the general public who preferred to see her portrayed as the repentant penitent.