This ivory panel is the left leaf from a diptych, made in about 1300, probably in France.
Joseph of Arimathea is shown supporting the body of Christ whose right hand is held by the Virgin. On the right stands St John while in the foreground Nicodemus kneels to withdraw the nail from Jesus' feet. Above the group there are two flying Angels. The whole image is surrounded by a plain border.
The placement of a single register scene of the Deposition on the left leaf of a diptych is extremely unusual, and raises the question of what the right leaf originally showed. A possibility seen on another diptych in Berlin, would for example have the Entombment on its right leaf.
The devotional diptych is in many ways the object type most associated with the notion of Gothic ivory carving. The earliest examples probably date to the 1240s; these are complex, large and ambitious works that emerged, somewhat surprisingly, with no obvious precursors. The owners of ivory diptychs sometimes appear within their images. Such portraits indicate that they were special requests on the part of their commissioners, and they parallel the similar figures that appear in manuscripts and panel paintings of the period. The iconography of Gothic diptychs oscillated between two poles. The first of which is the desire to present narratives (Life of Christ and Virgin Mary) for envisaging. The second was the use of non-narrative images to form the focus of devotion.