The panel of the Ascencion is one of the four compartments of an altarpiece by Bartolomé Bermejo, a painter from Cordoba that developed his work known in the Corona de Aragón. Bermejo’s work, characterized by a realism that has no idealisations, incorporates many of the novelties of the Nordic art, like the use of oil as binder, replacing egg tempera.

All four paintings were part of the same predella dedicated to Christ the Redeemer, which has been identified as the one from a documented altarpiece by the painter, devoted to Santo Domingo de Silos (Daroca). The works were documented in Paris in 1898, in the collection of the painter Carlos Sáenz de Tejada, on whose death they were acquired by José Muñoz Ortiz, who sold them in 1914: the first two to the Museu d’Art i d’Arqueologia de Barcelona, through the mediation of Salvador Sanpere i Miquel, and the other two to Teresa Amatller i Cros, through the intervention of Josep Gudiol.

The other panels of this set can also be seen at the museum: Resurrection, Descent of Christ into Limbo and Entrance into Paradise and vision of the Crucified.