The painting was made in 1642 for the church of San Lorenzo and is part, together with other paintings commissioned for the same abbey by the Olivetan monks, of the first public undertaking entrusted to the artist in the city. The birth of the virgin is illustrated according to the story of the apocryphal gospels. The scene shows in the foreground the large basin ready for the baby girl's bath, behind her the maid waiting to dry the baby. On the right a second maid spreads a cloth in front of the fire and in the background, in the shade, Anna rests in bed while on the left Joachim peeps out.

The sacred event is enriched by details of everyday life, almost domestic; in this canvas the Miradori just transferred to Cremona proves to be able to update the most intimately Genoese elements of his training thanks to a look at the natural one closest to Lombard painting.