The Fifth Sign of the Last Judgment, 1440-1470 15 1/8 x 9 1/8 inches.

At its best, the beautiful English alabaster from the Victoria and Albert Museum on exhibit at the Society of the Four Arts is a window into the Middle Ages.

Alabaster is a soft stone that gradually dissolves in water, so the pieces were limited to interior display. The production of alabaster thrived in the midlands of England, usually around Nottingham, between about 1350 and 1530, partially because it was relatively inexpensive and easier to work than marble.

What makes the 60 pieces in the exhibit special, aside from the often bold bas-relief perspectives, is that many of them carry a lot of their original decorative painting, which gives a further insight into the values and tastes of the 14th and 15th century people who bought alabaster as affordable art.

The best of them are like miniature three-dimensional tapestries come to life – they tell a story, using some surprisingly contemporary styles.

Take, for instance, Fifth Sign of the Last Judgment, from the mid-15th century. The design scheme focuses on the Christmas colors of green and red, with some gilt remaining as well, and the figures are far more limber in their characterization than is usually the case with art of this period, which tends toward stock poses of piety.

Similarly, Agony in the Garden, an image of Christ, bears more than a slight resemblance to the Gauguin work on the same subject. Another, The Flagellation, offers stylized figures that resemble Giocometti in particularly bold relief.

The artists weren’t constrained by any concerns about historical accuracy – the Roman soldiers in some of the panels are dressed in the unmistakable outfits of medieval infantry.

The figures are often startling in their configuration. When you factor in the decorative painting that would have altered the sameness of alabaster’s natural shade, which runs from ivory to light brown, the results would have been startling.

The Ascension, from the late 14th century, shows only the lower part of Christ’s robes as he moves toward heaven, concentrating on a symmetrically arranged grouping of Mary and the apostles as they gaze upward. There’s also a grim humor in a grouping entitled The Resurrection, with Christ stepping out of his tomb and onto a presumably thunderstruck, prone Roman soldier – also costumed in medieval clothes.

The pieces on display are usually around 10 x 12 or so, sized for ease of display in devotional displays or mini-shrines in the equivalent of middle-class homes.

The Reformation put a decisive end to the large-scale production of alabaster panels, because the predominant images are not only Christian but Catholic. (Thomas Becket is already ascending to sainthood in several of the panels.) There is also an attendant emphasis on torture – the head of John the Baptist, the disemboweling of Saint Erasmus.

Despite the occasional burst of grue, the work of the anonymous artists in this beautiful exhibit is consistently memorable – you can almost hear the lute music.

If you go

OBJECT OF DEVOTION: Medieval English Alabaster Sculpture from the Victoria and Albert Museum: Through Jan. 16 at the Society of the Four Arts, Palm Beach. Information: (561) 655-7226