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Virgin and Child

The Holy Family

Shown from the waist up, a young woman embraces a baby in this vertical painting. They both have peachy skin, reddish-blond hair, and round faces. The woman is angled to our left and almost takes up the height of the painting. She looks down with gray eyes through lowered lids, under slender, arched brows. She has a straight nose and her pale pink lips are closed. Barely visible, a thin dotted white line spans her brow. A few loose, copper-colored tendrils frame her face under an azure-blue mantle that drapes over her head, shoulders, and arms. Under the mantle she wears a brick-red robe with a stylized, plant-like pattern in gold on the upper bodice and the cuff we can see. Her left elbow, on our right, rests on a sage-green ledge that runs along the bottom edge of the composition, and that hand dangles over the child’s leg. Her other hand curves around the baby’s back. The child is turned to our right to face the woman. He is wrapped in a cloak the same red as the woman's robe, and it has a thin gold border. He sits on a kelly-green cushion resting along the left side of the ledge. His head is turned to gaze off to our right with large hazel eyes under thin brows. He has a button nose and a rosy flush around his small pink mouth, which is slightly open. His right hand dips into the woman’s neckline while the other arm embraces her neck. His right leg stretches out toward her so one pudgy foot peeks out from under the red cloth. The horizon of the landscape behind them comes halfway up the painting. Sloping fields are dotted with trees. Low hills are ice blue in the hazy distance along the horizon, and the sky above is nearly white near the mountains, deepening to pale blue along the top edge.

This intimate devotional panel, an early work by Antonio da Correggio, reveals the young artist's evolving style. The distant landscape demonstrates his awareness of Northern European precedents, and the figural composition references the manner of Raphael, while its soft outlines recall Da Vinci. The gentle sensuousness of the figures and the tenderness they show one another, however, are unique to Correggio.

A young, bearded man wearing only a white loincloth stands facing us in a pale blue river with a man to one side and a winged angel to the other in this vertical painting. They all have pale or tanned skin and tawny-brown hair. The man at the center, Jesus, stands knee-deep in the placid water with his hands together in prayer. He looks off to our left, his hollow eyes set above a drooping mouth. To our left, a man kneels on the rocky riverbank and trickles water from his hand onto Jesus’s head. That man wears a fawn-brown robe under a raspberry-red cloak. He is bearded with curly brown hair, and he has dark circles under his eyes and a downturned mouth. The winged angel stands to our right on a flat stone, closer to us. Gold and pink wings rise vertically along the right edge of the composition. The angel wears voluminous white robes and holds a marine-blue garment in both hands. A white dove hovering over Jesus’s head is surrounded by a halo edged with teal, pea-green, and pink rings. A bearded man wearing a tiered, jeweled crown looks down from a round opening in the ice-blue sky above the dove. He holds one hand up in blessing and holds an orb topped by a cross in the other. About ten fish nibble at the rocks near Jesus’s feet in the river, which winds through a pale green field to a town of turrets and towers in the distance.

Madonna and Child

A woman wearing long robes and standing on an upturned, gold crescent moon is surrounded by twenty winged angels who lift her up, sing, or play musical instruments in this vertical painting. Below, a grassy landscape with rocky hills, a river, and buildings stretches into the distance. Along the top edge of the painting and smaller in scale, more angels surround two men sitting on a throne, holding a crown. All the people have smooth, pale skin, oval faces with small, delicate facial features, and long wavy hair. They wear fluttering, jewel-toned robes. The woman at the center, Mary, stands facing us with her eyes downcast and her hands held together in prayer. Her strawberry-blond hair lightens where her hair rests over her shoulders, and a jeweled band encircles her head. She wears a long, ruby-red dress with a jeweled neckline and navy-blue cloak trimmed with gold. Eight of the winged angels seem to lift her body, four along each side. Seven more angels float around the scene playing instruments, including a lute, a harp, recorder-like instruments, and stringed instruments, one of which resembles a violin and another a dulcimer. Along the top of the group, around Mary’s head, four angels sing, holding sheet music. In tiny letters, writing on the sheet of music to our left reads, “A ve regina celorum mr regis,” while the writing on the music to our right reads, “A Tenor ve regina.” The angels wear robes in emerald green, royal or sky blue, butter yellow, rose pink, tomato red, silver, or white, and their wings match their robes. Some of the robes are embroidered with gold and some angels wear jeweled diadems. The edges of an oval, gold halo are visible behind the angels at Mary’s head and feet. Above Mary and the angels, a scene, much smaller in scale, recedes into the distance within a ring of dark clouds. Two haloed, bearded men wearing scarlet-red robes and with shoulder-length brown hair sit on a wide throne covered with a black and gold brocade cloth. The man to our left is bareheaded and the man to our right has a tall, blue and gold crown. A white dove with wings spread hovers above a second gold crown they hold between them. More than a dozen angels surround the throne, holding up the cloth or singing. A black and red checked tile floor stretches in front of the throne. Along the bottom edge of the painting, beneath Mary and the angels, a grassy landscape with fields and trees stretches into the distance to gray castle-like structures. A river winds from the lower right between the buildings. A man rides a horse near the riverbank to our right, and the shore is lined with minuscule shells. To our left, a second man walks in the field, away from us toward the building, and another man crosses a short bridge over a second, smaller stream.

A young, pale-skinned woman with reddish-blond hair sits with a nearly nude, chubby toddler standing in her lap in this vertical painting. She looks down at him, her body and face angled to our left. Thin lines creating a gold halo fan out from the back of her head. An ivory-white scarf wraps around her head and trails down the back of her neck where it is tucked into a dark, teal-blue cloak covering her shoulders and draping across her lap. Under the robe, she wears a loose, cherry-red gown with vertical pleats over her chest. The baby, also with pale skin, reddish blond hair, and a delicate gold halo, looks up at her face with light brown eyes. He stands on the woman’s right thigh, to our left. One of the woman's hands wraps around his body and supports his legs, while she props up his chest with her other. A length of pale gray fabric wraps over one shoulder and around his stomach. The two are situated in front of a column and pillar supporting a horizontal lintel overhead. The view beyond is of a blue sky over a golden field with dark green conical cypress trees in the distance.

Against a deep, hilly landscape, a young woman sits facing us on a rocky ledge with a small child in her lap in this square painting. The woman and child, Mary and Jesus, both have pale skin and blond hair. Mary wears a cobalt-blue gown over a coral-pink undergarment that peeks out from under the bottom hem and at her cuffs. A paler blue mantle is draped over the back of her head and falls to cover her shoulders and body. A sheer white veil covers her hair and forehead. Jesus wears a sheer white, loose, long-sleeved tunic. Both gaze downward to the bunch of green grapes Mary holds delicately in her left hand, to our right. Jesus reaches forward with both hands to pluck some fruit as Mary supports his body with her other hand. An oval shaped, woven basket with a lid sits on the ground next to Mary’s feet. The gray, rocky outcropping on which they sit is blanketed with straw-colored moss or other growth. A small clearing behind the pair is framed by trees on either side. The trees have tall, slender trunks speckled with light gray patches and canopies of olive and celery-green leaves. To our left and beyond the outcropping, a gray donkey stands behind a tree, nibbling on some grasses at the edge of the outcropping. To our right, in the middle distance, a pale-skinned, bearded man stands and arches back with a long stick raised overhead, as if about to strike the tree in front of him. Beyond him and about two-thirds of the way up the panel, a row of dark green shrubbery separates the clearing from rolling blue hills in the distance.

Jean Hey, known as the Master of Moulins, was a leading painter in 15th-century France. Here, he captured the moment the archangel Gabriel announced to Mary that she would give birth to a son. The painting once formed the right side of an altarpiece, with the left side depicting Mary’s own Immaculate Conception and a central section, now lost, featuring the enthroned Virgin and Child.

A woman with pale white skin and her blond hair covered by a wide veil is shown from the waist up in this vertical portrait painting. Her folded hands rest on the lower edge of the panel, suggesting that she sits just on the other side, close to us. The transparent white veil covers her blond hair and falls in stiff, wide panes down in front of her shoulders. Her hair is pulled back behind a black ribbon over a high forehead. Her light brown eyes are downcast and she has a straight nose and full, pale pink lips. Her chest is covered by another veil and is tucked into the deep V-neck of her long-sleeved, black dress. A wide scarlet-red belt adorned with an ornately filigreed gold belt buckle encircles her narrow waist. Her skin, white veils, and red belt contrast sharply with her velvety black dress and the dark pine green of the background.

This painting depicts a woman holding a child. The woman is turned towards the left, and she looks down at the child in her lap. She has pale skin, reddish-brown hair, high, arched, eyebrows, and thin, slightly downturned lips. Her hair is put up above her head under a red and brown net with a thin veil hanging over her face. A golden halo is behind her head. Her clothes are ornate, in shades of gold and brown with a collar decorated with pearls and green gems. The child is nude except for a red necklace and red bracelets. They also have pale skin and brown hair, and they are looking up at the woman. The child rests on a green cushion and holds a light pink peach or apple in one hand, and there is a faint golden halo around their head. Next to the woman, on a white marbled surface, is a white bowl of light pink fruit. Behind her is a landscape of green fields, tree-lined, rocky hills, and a light blue body of water. The sky above is a gradient of blue, white towards the horizon and fading into dark blue at the top of the painting. Puffy white clouds drift across the top of the sky.

The Birth and Naming of John the Baptist

Saint John on Patmos

Madonna and Child with Two Angels

Shown from the knees up, a pale-skinned woman sits in front of a vast landscape and holds a nude baby boy on her lap in this horizontal painting. The woman, Mary, sits with her knees angled to our left, but she looks at us from the corners of brown eyes. She has a delicate nose, smooth cheeks, a pointed chin, and her pink lips are closed. A few strands of blond hair escape from braids that overlap across the top of her head. She wears a rose-red dress over a translucent white undergarment, which is visible along the neckline and on the forearms. A cloth striped with azure and powder blue, pale pink, lemon yellow, and teal drapes across her seated thighs and wraps back around her hips. One hand rests in her lap near one of the baby’s feet, and the other braces the child’s other hip. The baby, Jesus, has tightly curled blond hair and a flushed face. His body resembles a somewhat muscular adult. Jesus rests his shoulders back against the woman’s chest and turns to look up at her. One hand touches one of her breasts and the other holds a butterfly by its parchment-yellow wings. The foot not by the woman’s hand rests on a gold dagger near the woman’s far hip. A gnarled tree with dark green leaves winds from a rocky crag to our left. The pair are lit from our left, and Mary casts a shadow on the large, flat boulder on which she sits. The land dips steeply down beyond the boulder. A man wearing a pale pink garment that flaps in the wind stands on a rocky outcropping near a grazing animal. Tiny in scale, three more people walk or run in the distance to our right. Stone structures are tucked in among tree-dotted hills that roll gently back to a hazy blue, mountainous horizon, which comes about five-sixths of the way up this composition. The sky above is a similar icy blue.

A winged angel, a woman, and a baby are gathered on a terrace that overlooks a softly lit landscape in this vertical painting. The people all have parchment-white skin tinged faintly with green, delicate gold halos, and they are close to us. The baby is round and plump, and faces us as he lies on his side on a carpet of pine-green grass dotted with small white and pink flowers. A band of caramel brown spans the lower edge of the painting. Propped up on one elbow, the baby turns his blond head to look at the woman kneeling beside him to our right. The woman, Mary, towers over the baby with her body angled slightly to our left. A midnight-blue cloak trimmed in gold is wrapped around her coral-red gown. The fingertips of her raised hands lightly touch as she bows her head and lowers her brown eyes to look at the child. A transparent white veil drapes over her blond hair. To our left, the angel also kneels and looks down at the baby with arms crossed over the chest. The angel has curly, copper-red hair and wears a carnation-pink robe over a transparent chemise. Semi-transparent, bronze-colored wings nearly disappear into the background. Just beyond the trio, a low balustrade with an opening near Mary encloses the space. A colonnade with arched openings extends into the distance to our left, behind the angel. A flat, olive-green wall rises the height of the painting behind Mary. Between them, the landscape is carpeted with moss and celery-green grass, and dotted with trees. A river winds toward slate-gray hills in the deep distance.

Margaret of Austria

A woman and nude child, both with pale skin, sit in front of a deep landscape in this vertical painting. Shown from about the knees up, the woman’s body is angled slightly to our right, and she supports the baby under his bottom with her left hand, on our right. She wears a long-sleeved, crimson-red dress with a sheer, nearly translucent fabric around her shoulders. Fern-green drapery, nearly matching the color of the grassy landscape, is gathered behind her hips, and a deep lapis-blue cloth lies across her lap. Her blond hair is pulled back. She has a straight nose, rosy cheeks, and her pink lips are closed. Her head tilts to our left, and she gazes down and to our right with brown eyes. Her right hand, on our left, rests in her lap, and she holds the baby with her other hand. The blond baby half sits, half stands on the woman’s lap so one foot rests on the hand in the woman’s lap. He reaches his arms around her neck and turns to look over his left shoulder, also gazing down and to our right. Thin, gold halos above their heads are barely visible against the pale blue sky. An expanse of green grass extends behind the pair leading to a cluster of trees to our left and buildings on a distant hill to our right. Hazy blue hills line the horizon in the distance below a blue, nearly cloudless sky.

A woman and winged angel, both with pale, peach skin, are situated in a church interior in this tall, narrow painting. To our left, the angel has long, blond, curly hair, smooth skin, and is smiling. The wings are outlined in royal blue, and they blend from blue to green to yellow to crimson. The angel holds one hand, closer to us, up at chest height with the index finger subtly pointing upward. Holding a long scepter in the other hand, the angel angles their body toward the woman to our right. The angel wears a gold jewel and pearl-encrusted crown and a jeweled long, voluminous robe in scarlet-red and shimmering gold brocade. The neck and along the opening down the front are lined with pearls and jewels. The angel looks toward the woman, who wears a royal-blue dress tied with a red belt at the high waist. Her long brown hair is tied back but one tendril falls over her left shoulder, to our right. She kneels facing us with her raised hands facing outward. Her head is tipped a bit to our left, and she looks up and into the distance to our right with lips slightly parted. She kneels behind a book lying open on a low table. A vase of white lilies and a red cushion lies on the floor in front of the table, close to us. The floor is decorated with people and scenes outlined in black and set into square panels, as if inlaid with wood. The church behind and above the people has a row of tall, narrow arches with bull’s-eye glass windows. A walkway lined with columns runs above the arches, and sunlight comes in through arched windows under the flat wood ceiling. A white dove flies toward the woman on gold lines from a window at the upper left of the painting. Latin words painted in gold capital letters are exchanged between the people. The angel says, “AVE GRA PLENA.” The letters of the woman’s response are painted upside down and backward: “ECCE ANCILLA DNI.”

In the stone ruins of a building, a woman, Mary, kneels with her hands in prayer over a thin-limbed baby lying in front of her in this vertical painting. There is a man behind Mary, to our left, two more in a field to our right, and a winged angel in the upper right corner. They all have pale skin. Mary’s unbound blond hair falls over her shoulders. She wears a celestial-blue dress, and her teal-blue cloak is edged with gold. Her body is angled to our right, and she looks down her straight nose at the baby near her knees. The nude baby has blond curls and a chubby tummy and cheeks. An ox and an ass look down at the baby from behind a stone trough to our right. The man behind Mary wears a forest-green cap and scarf over a tomato-red robe. One hand rests on a staff, and he looks up at the angel in the top right corner. An owl looks down at the man from atop the stone ruins, near the top left corner. Two men recline and about a dozen white sheep lie on low hills in the near distance to our right. One of those men sleeps and the other holds up both hands as he looks into the sky. The angel in the top right corner emerges from a petal-pink and pale yellow halo against a star-strewn blue sky. The angel wears rose pink and has dark pink wings. A scroll held across both arms reads, “GLO” and “INECELSIS DEO.”

Adoration of the Christ child with the young St. John the baptist,St. Romuald,angels,the hands of God the Father and the Holy Ghost as a dove - Filippo Lippi

Close to us, a bearded, balding man leads a donkey carrying a woman and child to our right against a hilly landscape in this horizontal painting. All three people have pale, peachy skin and halos. The man has a gray beard and hair, and wears a royal-blue tunic under a ruby-red robe. He leans on a walking stick and looks back at the donkey. The woman riding the donkey wears a blue and gold brocade-like cloak covering her head and body. She has a straight nose, small pink lips, and she looks toward the infant she holds close to her body. The baby wears a white garment and reaches for the woman’s face with one hand as he turns to look over his shoulder toward us. The path they walk on is lined with grass and detailed plants. A river runs parallel to the path a short distance away. The horizon line comes about two-thirds of the way up the painting is lined with green trees, blue mountains, and a few buildings to our left. Wispy white clouds sweep across an azure-blue sky streaked with peach near the horizon.

The Holy Family with Saint John the Baptist and Saint Margaret

The Adoration of the Magi

This painting shows a woman sitting and cradling an infant on her lap. The woman faces slightly left and looks down at the child with a slight smile. She has pale skin and golden hair covered by a semi-translucent white veil. She wears a red garment with gold embroidery and a dark blue cloak with gold trim and a star-shaped brooch on her shoulder. The infant has curly golden hair and is dressed in a sheer garment, looking up towards the woman. Surrounding these two people are more people with wings and cherubic children with the bodies of red-and-gold birds. All of these people have pale skin and golden hair, and they wear colorful robes in shades of red, white, and light blue. Everyone in the painting has a golden halo around their head, and the background is a decorative golden surface with intricate patterns around the edge of the painting.

This painting depicts a woman seated outdoors with a baby in her lap on the left and a young child standing nearby on the right. The woman is sitting on the ground, while the baby is facing the right with their arms outstretched. The baby is partially wrapped in a white cloth. The woman has a serene expression and delicate facial features. She is wearing a green and red robe. The young child on the right is holding a small lamb and has curly blond hair. In the upper left corner of the painting, two cherubic faces peer down from a cloud. The background shows a pastoral setting with trees, shrubs, hills, grass patches, and bunnies near the forest edge, under a cloudy sky.

The Annunciation

A woman and two children, all with pale skin and flushed cheeks, sit together in a landscape in this round painting. The woman takes up most of the composition as she sits with her right leg, to our left, tucked under her body. Her other leg, on our right, is bent so the foot rests on the ground, and that knee angles up and out to the side. She wears a rose-pink dress under a topaz-blue robe, and a finger between the pages of a closed book holds her place. Her brown hair is twisted away from her face. She has delicate features and her pink lips are closed. She looks and leans to our left around a nude young boy who half-sits and half-stands against her bent leg. The boy has blond hair and pudgy, toddler-like cheeks and body. The boy reaches his right hand, on our left, to grasp the tall, thin cross held by the second young boy, who sits on the ground next to the pair. This second boy has darker brown hair and wears a garment resembling animal fur. The boy kneels facing the woman and looks up at her and the blond boy. The trio sits on a flat, grassy area in front of a body of water painted light turquoise. Mountains in the deep distance are pale azure blue beneath a nearly clear blue sky.

A man, woman, and four winged angels gather and kneel around a nude infant lying on the ground under a stone arched opening set in front of a landscape in this vertical painting. All of the people have pale white or lightly tanned skin. To our left, the woman wears gold-edged, royal-blue robes and has long, curly brown hair. The baby lies on the hem of her robe, his body facing her. An older, balding and bearded man kneels to the right, leaning on a walking stick. He wears a red garment under a green robe, and he holds a hat in his hands as he gazes at the baby. About a third the size of the man and woman, two of the angels kneel between the man and woman and another pair kneel to our left of the woman, seeming close to us. The angels wear colorful gold, pink, red, or yellow robes and all have long wavy blond hair. Their hands touch in prayer and all look down toward the baby. The people are sheltered in front of a crumbling stone wall under a wooden structure. To our left, a cow and donkey are penned in a stable. Two pairs of men stand near or lean on the other side of the rock wall that encloses the scene. A landscape with green rolling hills and a distant town with towers and buildings fills the background beneath a clear blue sky. A triangular structure made of wood beams is framed within the carved archway, which seems to separate us from the space of the painting. The face of the arch looks like it is carved with a nude man atop a column to the left and a similar woman to the right, and with miniature scenes stacked on tiny platforms curving upward to the apex of the arch.

A woman wearing a cobalt-blue robe and a white veil sits with her hands raised, palms out, as she looks toward a slender, bearded man who stands to our left in this vertical painting. Both have light skin and delicate features, and they sit in a room with stone walls and arched windows. There are faint circles under the woman’s light brown eyes. She has a long slender nose, and her pink lips are pursed. One knee is bent, and she is low to the ground, suggesting she sits on a stool. A book lies open on a wooden stand in front of her to our right, below her left elbow. The ruffled edges of her multi-layered, white veil sweep over her forehead and down to her shoulders. Her loose, long-sleeved blue garment is edged with gold and falls in angular folds to pool at her feet. She holds her long-fingered, slender hands up at her chest, palms facing the man to our left. He stands with his body angled toward her as he looks down, his head tipped slightly forward. His brown hair falls over his shoulders. His voluminous, gold-edged, red cloak is fastened at his throat with a gold, jeweled brooch, and it drapes over his shoulders and around his lower torso, leaving his arms, chest, and a gash over his right ribs exposed. He holds a tall, gold staff topped with a jeweled cross in his left hand, to our right. A moss-green pennant flutters back from the base of the cross, as if lifted in a breeze. The man holds up his other hand so the palm faces the woman with the first two fingers raised. Round, puncture wounds with red blood mark the palm of that hand and tops of both bare feet. The floor is patterned with gray, brown, blue, and green tiles. The wall behind the woman has honey-brown paneling along the bottom half and the top half is slate gray. Gray columns are spaced along that wall, supporting a curving, vaulted ceiling. Two arched windows pierce the wall behind the woman, and both have stained glass designs within the curving tops. The window closer to us opens onto a narrow view of a landscape with a rose-pink arch over a bridge, and a path winding through green fields. An open door over the shoulder of the man, to our left, shows the stepped roofline of a pink building under a blue sky. The entire scene is framed with a flattened arch supported by gleaming columns of polished, veined brown stone, creating the impression that we look onto the people and room through the arch. The columns have leafy capitals and white bases. The tan-colored arch is carved with a row of stylized rosettes along the opening that spans the top of the painting.

Bernat Martorell was one of the greatest painters in Catalonia, Spain, during the first half of the 15th century. Here, he rendered a frequently depicted episode from the popular legend of Saint George, in which the model Christian knight saves a town and rescues a beautiful princess. George’s halo and armor and the scaly dragon are richly modeled with raised stucco decoration.

A young girl stands next to and holds the hand of an elegantly dressed woman sitting in a wooden armchair near stone columns, in front of a crimson-red curtain pulled up to reveal a distant landscape view in this vertical portrait painting. The child and woman have smooth, light skin, and the fabric of their dresses has a silken sheen. To our right, the woman sits with her knees angled slightly to our left, and she looks at us with dark blue eyes under faint brows. Her brown hair is pulled back from her high forehead under a hair covering set with pearls. Her pointed chin is slightly pulled back, and her pale pink lips are closed. A teardrop-shaped pearl hangs from the ear we can see, and she wears two strands of pearls like a choker, above a thick, pleated lace ruff. The fabric of the long-sleeved bodice has a gold-on-gold pattern, and is lined with a row of buttons down the front. Filmy lace cuffs extend back over her forearms from her wrists. Her full, floor-length skirt is scarlet red with a gold, brocade-like pattern, and has silvery-gray stripes down the front and around the lower hem. The cloak she wears over the dress has a black-on-black floral pattern. Three thick gold chains hang across her bodice, and she wears a square-cut, gray stone set in a gold ring on the third finger of her left hand. To our left, the young girl stands next to the wooden arm of the chair and holds the woman’s hands with both of hers. The child looks at us with gray eyes, and her pale pink lips are parted in a slight smile. Her light brown hair is pulled back under a gray band, perhaps of fur, around her head, over an apricot-colored head covering that matches her dress. The tight-fitting, long-sleeved bodice is striped with bands of alternating gold and pink geometric designs against the apricot-peach background. A lace-edged collar lies across her shoulders. A red, oval pendant hangs from her three-standed pearl necklace, and she wears three pearl bracelets on one wrist. A thick gold chain falls across her chest and around one hip. The floor-length, full skirt has buttercup-yellow and shell-pink highlights on the coral-colored background. Behind the pair, the red curtain has been pulled up so it seems to flutter behind the woman’s head, in front of stone columns that frame a distant landscape view with trees. A blocky structure, presumably a building, sits on the far distant, hazy horizon. Light pours down in streaks from steel-gray clouds against a pale blue sky.

La pala fu commissionata per la cappella della villa medicea di Cafaggiolo,ristrutturata da Michelozzo nel 1451. Il Wedgwood Kennedy ipotizza una commissione da parte di Piero il Gottoso, per il quale il Baldovinetti aveva giá lavorato nella cappella della SS. Annunziata e, forse, in quella di S. Croce. Lo studioso suggerisce una datazione per la committenza al 1453, anno di nascita di Giuliano, secondogenito di Piero, avvalorata dalla presenza di San Giuliano insieme agli altri santi "medicei".

Paradise

A woman holding a nude baby boy sits on a blue patterned pillow on the floor in front of a brick-red curtain held up by two angels in this vertical painting. The people all have pale, almost gold-colored skin with a green cast, though their cheeks are flushed with pale pink. The woman sits facing us and looks slightly off to our right. She has almond-shaped eyes, a straight nose, and her lips are closed. She wears a blue cloak with a white hood over a shell-pink dress. Her right arm, on our left, rests in her lap and she supports the baby with her other arm. The baby’s nude body is pudgy like a baby but his face and head are proportioned more like an adult. His body turns toward the woman and he reaches up to her neck, and he looks into the distance to our left. Both have flat, plate-like gold halos. The winged angels holding up the red curtain also have halos and they wear blue robes. The curtain falls in gentle folds behind the mother and child, and fabric of the same color underneath the blue pillow on which they sit suggests that the curtain extends onto the floor. A dove, also haloed, floats at the top center of the painting. The gold background around the curtain and behind the angels and dove is painted into an arch over the people, and the upper corners of the panel are dark. A Latin inscription is painted with capital gray letters against a white band along the bottom edge of the panel: “AVE: MARIA: GRATIA: PLENA: DO.”

Portrait of a Lady

A smiling young woman and an elderly man with exaggerated features embrace and gaze into each other’s eyes while a person dressed in the orange costume of a fool lurks behind them to our left in this horizontal painting. All three have pale skin and are shown from the chest up behind a ledge or tabletop against a black background. The older man to our right wears a dark teal-blue garment and a bright crimson-red head covering that drapes over both shoulders. Wrinkles and age spots cover his face, which is accentuated by a bulbous nose and a leering smile that exposes missing teeth. His arms reach out and encircle the woman to our left. Cradling the right side of her head with his right hand, his left arm reaches across to her upper body, his thumb visible at her breast. A blue and gold band holds the woman’s auburn-brown hair back. A white shift peeks through the slashed sleeves of her emerald-green, gold-trimmed gown. She reaches toward the elderly man with her right arm, her hand holding his chin. Her left arm reaches across her body under his arm and she holds a leather pouch in that hand. A man wearing an orange cap with asses’ ears reaches for the pouch, eyes crossed and his tongue protruding from the side of his mouth. Playing cards and coins lie on the ledge to our left.

A winged angel with arms crossed kneels across from a young woman sitting and holding a book, both under an archway in a paneled room in this vertical painting. They both have pale, yellow-toned skin, blond hair, and flat, gold halos. They also have golden brown eyes, long, straight noses, smooth cheeks, and their pale, pink lips are closed. To our right, the woman sits in a throne-like chair with her body facing our left. Her head tilts down, and she looks toward the angel under lowered lids. Her hair is pulled back under the neck of the lapis-blue cloak she wears over a crimson-red dress. The dress and cloak are trimmed with gold, and a there is a gold starburst on the cloak over her left shoulder, closer to us. She holds her other hand up near that shoulder with her fingertips brushing her chest. With her other hand, she holds open the pages of a small book in her lap, so her fingers overlap some of the words. The entire Latin inscription would read, “virgo concipiet et pariet filium et vocabitur nomen eius emmanuel butirum et mel come dit ut fiat reprobare.” A slender, bone-white column separates her from the angel across from her, along the left edge of the painting. The angel has curly, shoulder-length hair and wears a robe with a gold, floral pattern against a burgundy-red background. Long, golden wings emerge from the shoulder blades and extend off the side of the composition. An open archway just beyond the angel is filled with streaks of flax yellow and burnt orange, possibly representing flames. Some of the walls in the room around the pair are pale olive green and other areas are darker spruce green. There are bands of coral-pink molding and inset panels of patterned mosaics. The flat ceiling of the space immediately over the pair is decorated with checkerboard panels in navy blue, hunter green, brown, and brick red. Gold lines create a ray coming from the ceiling toward the woman. At the back of the space, beyond the column separating the woman and angel, the room extends into an alcove with an arched hallway painted with gold stars against a midnight-blue background. Double doors open at the back of the alcove onto a room with a pale-yellow curtain with a mesh-like trim. We see the pair as if through a stone archway that lines the top and sides of the composition. The upper corners are filled with leafy decorations, as if carved into the stone.

Annunciation

A woman sits in the center of this vertical panel painting and gazes down at a baby lying across her lap while two winged angels hold up a red, gold, and black brocade-like patterned cloth behind her. All the people have pale skin, pink cheeks, blond hair, and flat, gold halos. The woman’s body is angled slightly to our right, and she holds her hands crossed over her chest as she gazes down at the baby. The woman has a straight, pointed nose and a small, pink-lipped mouth. Her azure-blue robe covers her head and drapes over much of the crimson-red dress beneath. The edge of the robe and cuff of her dress are trimmed in gold. The baby lies with his arms slightly raised, and he looks up at the woman. His hips and legs are wrapped with sheer white cloth. The angels in the upper corners of the panel both wear robes in the same azure blue of the woman, and the garments have a gold band around the high waist and gold around the neckline. They look at the woman and hold up the cloth that falls behind and under her and the baby.

Shown from the chest up, a clean-shaven, pale-skinned man holds one hand to his chest and rests the other on a rug-covered ledge with the other in this vertical portrait painting. The man’s body is angled to our left, and he looks down in that direction with dark eyes under thick brows. Crow’s feet crinkle at the corners of his eyes, and there are dark hollows underneath. Soft jowls hang to create a slight double chin. His thin lips are set in a line over a wide, round chin, which is darkened with a five o’clock shadow. He has chin-length, reddish-blond hair, and straight, wispy bangs sweep loosely across his high forehead. He wears a white chemise under a gold, brocade garment, which is mostly hidden by a slate-blue cloak. The cloak is lined with spotted fur, which is turned over to create a wide collar across his shoulders. The sleeve on his left arm, to our right and closer to us, splits over a dusky-pink sleeve. Two gold buttons on the cloak there are decorated with thistle plants and blossoms. The fingers of his right hand, to our left, are gathered like a closed rose bud at his chest. He wears a gold ring on the index finger of the other hand, which rests on the end of the gray stone ledge so his fingertips brush the tapestry draped there. The man is lit from our left against a black background.

Christ and the Virgin in the House at Nazareth

A young woman with pale skin and flushed cheeks stands in a landscape looking to our upper left in this round-topped vertical painting. Her body faces us in the center of the scene. Her fingers are interlaced at her waist, and her head tips slightly to our left. Honey-brown hair cascades over her shoulders, and her hazel eyes roll up under thin brows. She has a short nose and a small, pale pink mouth. A translucent scarf is tied around the full-length, pine-green mantle that drapes across her shoulders and wraps around the V-neck of her rose-red robe. A wine-red inset fills the neckline, and a matching belt is tied around her waist. She stands barefoot on the dirt ground, which is scattered with pebbles. Plants grow and bloom, including a blue iris, in shallow water along the bottom edge of the composition. A lidded pitcher with a narrow neck and scrolling handles sits on a flat rock next to her right knee. Taller, peanut-brown rock formations pile up beyond her under a powder-blue sky. Tawny-brown and sage-green trees, leafy plants, and shrubs sprout among the rocks. Beyond the woman is an open gate in a wooden fence built into one of the rock formations to our right, and sage-green hills dotted with moss-green trees roll out along the left side of the painting.

adoration of the Magi

A man hangs from a wooden cross at the top center of this vertical painting, with a woman standing at the foot of the cross to our left and a man to our right, all in front of a deep landscape with mountains along a river. All the people have light skin. The feet of the man on the cross, Jesus, line up with the tops of the heads of the people standing below. Jesus hangs by a nail driven through each palm, and his overlapping feet are nailed into a short platform that angles downward. He has shoulder-length brown hair and a short brown beard. His head tips forward, and his eyes are downcast or closed. He has a straight nose, high cheekbones, and his lips are closed. Blood trickles down his forehead from a ring of thorns around his head, from the nails in his hands and feet, and from a short gash over his right ribs, on our left. A white loincloth is wrapped around his hips, and the end of it flutters as if in a breeze to our left. The man’s body is lean but muscular. A slip of paper with the letters “INRI” has been affixed to a small panel on the cross above Jesus’s head. Below and to our left of the cross, a woman stands with her head bowed, looking down with her hands clasped in prayer. Her hair is covered with a tan-colored veil and she wears a gold-edged, navy-blue robe that covers her head and body. She and the cleanshaven, blond man standing to our right of the cross both have bare feet. The man looks up at the cross with his lips parted. His fingers are intertwined and then flipped, palms-down, with his arms straight. His raspberry pink-robe falls over one shoulder and around his hips, over a topaz-blue, ankle-length tunic. The dirt-packed ground on which they stand is lined along the bottom edge of the panel with plants and flowers. The golden-brown land dips beyond the people, leading down to a river that winds into the distance. A castle-like structure perches on cliff-like outcroppings high along the left edge of the painting, and buildings at the foot of that outcropping line the river. Two people walk and one person fishes off a bridge near the town. A few boats, one with full sails unfurled and another possibly with oars out to row, float in the river beyond, which is flanked in the deep distance by mountains painted blue in the haze. The horizon comes about halfway up the composition, crossing the painting just beneath Jesus’s feet. The sky above deepens from pale yellow along the horizon to robin’s egg blue where a few wispy clouds create streaks along the top edge.

Three women and five men play cards around a round table covered with piles of gold coins in this square painting. The people all have pale skin. The women have round faces, close-set, small eyes, delicate noses and lips, and cleft chins. They wear dresses with tight bodices and long sleeves, and cloth head coverings. The men have prominent, bumped noses, furrowed brows, and lines around their eyes. They wear hats and voluminous robes and coats in shades of ruby red, moss green, golden brown, and black. Two women and two men play cards, and each has a second person behind them or at their shoulders. The woman along the left edge of the painting wears gloves, and she looks out at us. She points at the table or at the space between her and another card player. She holds her cards up so the six of hearts at the front is visible in front of a face card of hearts and a card with spades. A clean-shaven man standing behind her stoops and drapes his arms across her shoulders, one hand limp and gesturing with a three and the other hand cupping the woman’s cards. He looks across the table. The next player is also a woman, who rests one wrist on her face-down cards on the table. She counts out coins with her other hand, and the bearded man behind her stands with one hand tucked into the opening of his robe, leaning back as he looks across the table. Next, a clean-shaven man holds three cards up to his chest as he turns to look to our left, his brows gathered and lips parted. A woman stands between these two players with a hand draped over each of their shoulders. She peers down at the man’s cards and makes a number two with that hand. Her other loose fist rests on the shoulder of the second female card player. The final pair, along the right edge of the painting, are two men. The card player holds his cards so we see the ace of spades at the front. He points at a row of coins or toward the gap left between him and the woman to our left. He leans forward and looks intently, chin jutted out, at the man with his hand tucked into his robe. A man with a long gray beard sits just over the fourth player’s shoulder and appears to look across the scene absently with heavy-lidded eyes. The round table is covered in a teal-blue cloth. A rectangular sideboard in the back left of the room is covered with a white cloth and holds a vase of white flowers, a vessel, a wooden basket, and a piece of fruit. The wall behind this is gray along the top and wood-paneled below. An alcove in the wall to the right holds two vessels, a round gold-colored, plum-sized object, and another basket. A pale yellow curtain is pulled to the right side of that alcove.

Shown from the thighs up, a pale-skinned woman wearing a cream-white gown ornamented with gold bows looks at us from the corners of her brown eyes in this vertical portrait. Her body faces us, but she turns her head to our left. She has thin, arched eyebrows, a straight nose, flushed cheeks, a dimple in her chin, and her pink lips are closed. Her chestnut-brown hair is parted down the middle and pulled back under a gold and pearl headdress, but two wispy curls lie on her smooth forehead near the temple we can see. A string of black pearls ending in a gold pendant hangs down the front of her ear. A white ruffled collar encircles her neck over two heavy, gold necklaces. A blue stone and a pearl in a gold setting lies on her chest, and the second chain reaches to her waist. The satin bodice is fitted, and the sleeves are puffy below the shoulders. Voluminous long sleeves are slitted and a white chemise patterned with delicate black designs is pulled through, creating little tufts. She wears three gold rings on her two hands. She holds white gloves and a pink carnation in one hand, which rests on a table covered in a red tapestry to our right, and a dark green feather fan in her other hand. Her gown splits over a pine-green skirt beneath. A shimmering, forest-green velvet curtain behind the woman sweeps to one side to reveal a caramel-grown stone pillar along the left edge of the painting.

St Fredianus Diverts the River Serchio

Shown from the waist up, a young woman with pale, peachy skin faces and looks directly at us in this vertical portrait painting. The subtly upturned corners of her mouth and the outer corners of her eyes are touched with shadows. Her delicate eyebrows are faintly painted over dark brown eyes. She has a long straight nose and an oval-shaped face framed by large teardrop pearl earrings. Her dark brown hair is parted down the middle and pulled back under a wide, gold-colored headdress, which creates a halo-like ring around her head. Precisely formed curls rest against her forehead over each temple. Her black dress has voluminous, puffy sleeves framing a sheer, butter-yellow panel covering her chest. White ruffles emerge at her neck and cuffs. A gold Maltese cross, which flares at the end of each arm, hangs from a thick gold chain that falls over her chest and down to her waist. She touches the chain with her left hand, on our right, and with the other she holds the body of a small furry brown animal with bared teeth. The background behind the woman is black down the center and a dark emerald-green curtain falls to either side.

A woman sitting on a throne supports a baby as twelve winged angels look on, all framed in a carved, gilded pointed arch in this vertical panel. It is the center of a three-panel triptych. The background behind all the people is gold, and the top of the panel comes to a rounded, pointed arch under a second taller, sharper point. Trios of spiraling columns frame the left and right sides. The woman, child, and angels all have pale skin tinged faintly with green, and rosy cheeks. They all have blond hair except for the woman, whose hair is covered, and all have plate-like gold halos that overlap, sometimes obscuring the bodies of others. The woman, Mary, faces us from her ivory-white, carved stone throne. She looks slightly above us with brown eyes under delicate brows. She has a small, straight nose, and her narrow pink lips are closed. The lapis-blue robe that covers her head and body is bordered with gold patterns, and has a starburst on her right shoulder, to our left. The pea-green underside of the mantle is visible where it turns over on the sleeves and down the front, and the robe is worn over an ivory-white dress patterned with gold. The child she holds with both hands, Jesus, stands on her lap and wraps one arm around her neck. His other hand grips the high neckline of her dress. He looks up with dark, close-set eyes. He has curly blond hair, a double chin, and rounded cheeks. Two tiny teeth are barely visible below his pink upper lip. Despite the rounded cheeks, his face looks more like that of an adult, and the proportions of his body are also adult-like. He wears a gold-trimmed, pale pink robe over a blue garment, which stops just short of his bare feet. The twelve angels surrounding the throne are grouped in trios, with three looking on to our upper left, three to our upper right, and then two trios gathered in each lower corner. Their wings and robes are painted in tones of celery green, ruby red, butter yellow, and pale rose pink. Each has a triangular diadem above their foreheads. The floor beneath is patterned with gold against a burgundy-red background. Above Mary and Jesus, a bearded man is shown from the chest up in a shape made of three lobes alternating with three points. That man faces us and holds up his right hand, to our left, with the first two fingers raised. He wears a shell-pink garment under a green robe, and holds up an open book with Latin text with his other hand. The frame around Mary, Jesus, and the gable above is carved and gilded. Barely discernable, the panel is inscribed across the bottom below the throne, “AVE MARIA GRATIA PNELA DOMINUS.” The pages of the books read, “EGO SUM A O PRINCI PIU FINIS EGO SUM VI A. VERITAS VITA.”

The head, shoulders, and chest of a man wearing a deep rose-red garment fills this vertical portrait painting. His body is angled slightly to our left, and he looks directly at us from the corners of his eyes. His brown hair falls across his forehead, sweeps down over his ears, and curls gently at the nape of his neck. His eyebrows arch over brown eyes, and he has a long, angular nose. His upper lip is full, and his mouth is closed. He has high cheekbones and a cleft in his chin. The high collar is a black band over the voluminous red garment, which falls in pleats or folds down his chest. His right hand, on our left, lifts to clutch the fabric near his chest, in the lower left corner of the painting, and he wears a gold ring on his pinky finger. The background behind the man fades from dark aquamarine blue across the top to pale arctic blue at his shoulders, which span the width of the composition.

This vertical portrait painting shows the head, shoulders, and chest of a pale-skinned young man in front a cream-white, stone window that opens onto blue sky. The man’s body is angled slightly to our left and he looks directly at us with wide-set, pale blue eyes. He has smooth skin, a rounded nose, a wide jawline, and full, light pink lips. He wears a brimless crimson-red cap over brown hair that curls over his ears and down to the nape of his neck. His slate-blue jacket is lined with brown, perhaps fur, around the high neck and down the front. The jacket has puffy sleeves and vertical pleats over the chest. He is positioned in front of the stone opening, the edges of which run parallel to top and sides of the composition. Vivid blue sky fills the opening behind the young man.

Shown from the shoulders up, a man with peachy skin looks off to our left as he holds the feathered end of an arrow up in a hand resting along the bottom edge of this vertical portrait painting. Shown against a marine-blue background, he looks into the distance with hazel eyes under bushy eyebrows. He has a long, bumped nose, and his full, pale pink lips are closed. His round cheeks are tinged with pink, and there is a hint of a five-o-clock shadow around his mouth and jawline. Chestnut-brown, curly hair hangs to the base of his neck, and wispy curls fall across his forehead from under his tall, chocolate-brown cap. The cap has a small gold pin high over the ear we can see. The man wears a garnet-red jacket with a black collar over a white collarless shirt decorated with five black, narrow bands below the neckline. The fingers of his right hand, to our left, rest with the fingertips braced along on the bottom edge of the painting, as if along a ledge. He pinches the shaft of an arrow with his index finger and thumb, so we see the sienna-brown feathers. He wears a gold ring embedded with a small blue gem near the first knuckle of his ring finger.

The Holy Family with Saints Anne and Catherine of Alexandria

Dozens of people form a line starting from an opening in a city wall or building in the background to a rustic shed-like structure close to us, to kneel before a seated woman holding a baby on her lap in this vertical painting. All of the people have pale skin tinged faintly with green. The top edge of the panel is shaped so it has two rounded sections like shoulders leading to a stepped, crown-like form with an inward curving triangle at the top. A nickel-gray, crenelated stone wall of a distant city is nestled into the top, stepped section, with a glimmering gold sky above filling the uppermost triangle. Tile-roofed and domed buildings and a few towers appear densely packed beyond the wall. People on foot and horseback create a line from an arched opening in the wall toward us and to our right. Three of the people on horseback in the distance wear long robes and have gold halos. The line of people winds behind a tall, narrow hill to our right and it continues close to us. Two horses, two camels, and several people wait to the right but our attention is drawn to the trio in the foreground, Mary, Jesus, and Joseph, and the three men near the infant, the Magi. Mary wears a lapis-blue mantle covering her head and shoulders over a petal-pink dress, and she sits on a wooden or stone chest in the center of the painting. Her body faces us but she turns her face to look with pale blue eyes off to our right. In one hand she holds a hexagonal gold vessel that tapers to a flame-like finial. With the other hand, on our left, she supports the blond infant sitting in her lap. He is covered only with a white cloth around his waist, and he looks toward the vessel as he holds up the index and middle fingers of his right hand. To our left and slightly behind Mary, a balding man with white hair and beard and wearing a blue garment under a red robe sits with his head propped in his hand, looking down. His other hand rests on what might be the handle of a crutch or staff. The man, woman, and child have gold halos with what appears to be writing. The three Magi also have gold halos and they all wear scarlet-red shoes. The oldest kneels before Mary and kisses Jesus's feet. He has a long, light gray beard and is balding. He wears a brocade-like gold robe over pale brick-red sleeves. A cleanshaven man with dark brown hair and wrinkles around his mouth kneels to our left as he raises a jewel-encrusted gold crown from his head. He wears a gold and red floral-patterned garment and holds a rounded vessel, also with a flame-like finial. A younger, cleanshaven man with smooth features and shoulder-length, curling blond hair to our right also wears a gold crown. A dagger hangs from the waist of his sky-blue tunic, and his leggings are pale plum purple. Both arms are bent to his hands are held up, and in his right hand, he holds another tabernacle-like gold vessel. The structure to our left houses a donkey and bull munching hay. A gold sunburst floats above the roof, which seems to be built up against the stone wall of a building. The hills and trees beyond the people is painted with pine and moss greens and brown.

Portrait de l'artiste tenant un chardon

Madonna and Child with Donors

A young, pale-skinned woman with long, blond hair and wearing a coral-red gown stands on a pedestal before a landscape filled with people in this vertical painting. The painting has an arched top, and the woman who fills most of the view is Claudia Quinta. Her hair is adorned with strands of pearls, and a larger pearl hangs from a piece of jewelry like a brooch at the top center over her forehead. A sheer veil covers the back of her head. Her body faces us but she turns her head slightly to our right, so she gazes at us from the corners of her light hazel eyes. A pearl necklace with a square gold, sapphire-blue jewel and pearl pendant encircles her neck. The brown sleeves of her dress are flecked densely with short gold lines, and white fabric shows at gaps over the elbows. The red bodice has a high waist tied with a brown belt, which also holds sheer fabric in place so it falls to her knees over the long red skirt. The skirt is bordered with a gold geometric design along the bottom hem, which stops just short of her sandaled feet. In her right hand, on our left, she holds a small, navy-blue boat with a gold figure standing in it. Her other hand rests by her left thigh, to our right. She balances near the front edge of the rectangular pedestal, which is pale violet purple. On the front face, two winged, chubby children are painted white to resemble stone carvings. They brace a panel bordered in gold. The plaque has a teal-blue background, and gold letters read, “CLAVDIA CASTA FVI NEC VVLGVS CREDIDIT AMEN ET TAMEN ID QVOD ERAM TESTIS MIHI PRORA PROBAVIT CONSILIVM ET VIRTVS SVPERANT MATERQVE DEORVM ALMA PLACET POPVLO ET PER ME HVNC ORATA TVETVR.” Beyond Claudia Quinta a river winds in a tight S-curve through dark green hills. Farther back, to our left, a group of people with thin, elongated bodies dressed in blue, light brown, and orange walk in front of a tall dark blue building as they head toward a river on the right side. The building has an arched opening and a tower topped with a taupe-brown spire. To our right of Claudia Quinta, a woman wearing a rose-pink dress holds a rope around the prow of a boat at the edge of the river. Like the boat held by Claudia Quinta, it is navy blue and has the same shape. The pale lavender-purple river continues into the distance, where it meets rocky outcroppings along the horizon, which comes about halfway up the composition. A pale blue sky above is filled with wispy bands of clouds.

Shown from the waist up, a pale-skinned, round-cheeked young boy wears a brocade red and gold garment and hat in this vertical portrait painting. The boy’s body is angled to our left, but he turns his face toward us as he looks slightly down with gray eyes. He has a square face with a high forehead, faint brows, a small, rounded nose, bow-shaped pink lips, and a pointed chin. A fringe of pale blond hair lines the top of his head under a gold cap that ties under his chin. A white feather drops off the edge of a red disk around the top of the hat. His brilliant red garment is lined with gold bands, and the sleeves split over voluminous gold sleeves, which are lined with white ruffles at the wrists. The boy is behind a ledge draped with a crinkled, emerald-green cloth. He rests one hand on the ledge and holds a gold orb on a stick in that hand. His other hand hovers over the ledge with the palm facing out. The background is late gray. A strip of paper affixed to the front face of the ledge has eight lines of Latin text in all caps. It reads, “PARVVLE PATRISSA, PATRIÆ VIRTVTIS ET HÆRES ESTO, NIHIL MAIVS MAXIMVS ORBIS HABET. GNATVM VIX POSSVNT COELVM ET NATVRA DEDISSE, HVIVS QVEM PATRIS, VICTVS HONORET HONOS. ÆQVATO TANTVM, TANTI TV FACTA PARENTIS, VOTA HOMINVM, VIX QVO PROGREDIANTVR, HABENT VINCITO, VICISTI. QVOT REGES PRISCVS ADORAT ORBIS, NEC TE QVI VINCERE POSSIT, ERIT. Ricard: Morysini. Car:”

A woman and child sit on an ornate gold, curving throne in front of a shimmering gold background in this vertical painting. Two winged angels in roundels at the upper corners and the woman and child all have peach-colored skin with a gray cast. The woman tips her head toward the child, to our right. She has almond-shaped eyes, a long, straight nose, and her small lips are closed. She looks into the distance over the child’s head. She wears a scarlet-red mantle that covers her head and drapes over her shoulders and body. The azure-blue of her dress beneath is visible at her throat and over one knee. The child sitting on her knee is as tall as a toddler but has adult proportions in his face and body. He holds up his right hand, on our left, and raises the first two fingers. He holds a red scroll in his other hand. He wears a forest-green robe over a salmon-pink garment. The clothing of both the woman and child have geometric gold lines indicating folds in the drapery, and both have gold halos. The child’s halo is marked with three red arms to create a cross above and to the sides of his head. The woman rests her feet on a low stool in front of the opening of the elaborately carved, two-tier throne that nearly encircles the pair. The winged angels in the upper corners have gold halos, brown hair, jeweled, gold garments, and each holds an orb and scepter.

This painting shows a young man against an olive-green background. The man is standing, his body partially turned to the right, with one hand on his hip and the other near his waist. He is looking at us with a neutral expression. The man has light skin and short brown hair under a black hat with pointed ends on either side. He wears a dark outfit with a high white collar and puffed black sleeves. A thin gold ring is visible on his right hand. The green background has visible brushstrokes and some slight variation in color.

La Femme au miroir

Coronation of the Virgin

Floral Tent Panel

The laurel branch is a traditional Medici emblem.

On a tiled courtyard between buildings with arches and columns, a winged angel kneels and looks up at a woman standing to our right in this vertical painting. Both people have pale skin, blond hair, and plate-like gold halos at the back of their heads. To our left, the angel wears a silvery-white tunic under a scarlet-red cloak lined with cobalt blue. The wings are fawn brown on the underside, closer to the body, and aquamarine blue on the outside. Gold lines delineate feathers. The angel holds a white lily with two blooms and four buds on a long stem in the hand farther from us, which rests on a bent knee. The other hand is raised in front of the chest. The woman, Mary, stands along the right edge of the painting, her body angled toward the angel. Mary’s long, wavy hair falls to her shoulders, and she wears a lapis-blue robe with a pine-green lining over a red dress. She holds her right hand, farther from us, to her chest and touches the fabric of her cloak with the other, by her hip. The tip of one red shoe peeks out under her voluminous robe. Between the angel and Mary is a stone-white urn with scrolled handles, holding a bouquet of pink and white roses with dark green foliage. The ground is tiled with squares marbled in pale pink, sky blue, rust red, charcoal gray, and brown. Narrow, white panels between the tiles create a grid. The buildings around the pair are fog gray, parchment white, shell pink, or coral red, and are trimmed in black, red, or pink. Rows of arches recede into the square behind the angel and woman, ending at a coral-red wall that encloses the courtyard. An arched doorway in that wall opens onto a pathway leading over a small brook and into a hilly forest. A narrow, conical tree outside the courtyard reaches over the wall, into the vibrant blue sky above. A white dove descends from among the few scattered clouds with golden beams projecting toward the woman to our right.

About three dozen people gather in a grassy field to either side of a crumbling structure to kneel and pray before a woman and baby in the center of this horizontal painting. The woman, Mary, and baby, Jesus, have smooth, pale skin while the others have light or tanned skin. The structure has sand-colored stone pillars, a wooden triangular, pitched roof, and a straw floor. Mary, who has an elongated torso, sits facing us with her knees apart. She wears an azure-blue robe over a rose-pink dress. A shell-pink veil covers her head and body. Jesus sits on her left knee, his pudgy body angled to our left. He is nude except for a transparent cloth wrapped over one shoulder and the opposite hip. Mary’s left hand braces his torso. On Mary’s right, our left, Joseph, an older man, stands facing us. He clasps his hands at his chest and leans on a long stick. He has wrinkled skin, long, gray curly hair, and a full beard. Both Mary and Joseph tilt their heads to their right, our left, as they look down at Jesus. Joseph wears a golden yellow robe over a blue tunic. Joseph, Mary, and Jesus have faint gold halos. Behind them, a brown cow and gray donkey rest on the straw. People closest to Mary and Jesus kneel and bow their heads while the people to the left and right sides mostly stand. Three men kneeling closest to Mary and Jesus offer gifts, including a bronze vessel and a gold jar. One man has long dark brown hair and a beard, and wears a gold crown. Another man is bald with long gray hair and beard, while the third is cleanshaven with shoulder-length brown hair. These men wear robes in powder blue, carnation pink, or celery green with delicate silver and gold embelishments. Others in the crowd range in age from young and cleanshaven to older and bearded. They wear robes and tunics in shades of raspberry pink, butterscotch yellow, lapis blue, plum purple, or forest green. Several horses, their coats white or cinnamon brown, stand among the crowd, a few with riders. To our right, one horse rears its head and two others stand facing each other. Beyond the crowd, grassy green meadows and hills dotted with trees lead back to the horizon. A pale blue sky fills the top third of the composition.

Figures in the Woods

The Test of Fire of Moses

Three men with crowns and wearing gold-trimmed robes stand and kneel before a woman sitting on a wooden, box-like seat holding a baby to our right, in front of a rocky cave and landscape, in this horizontal painting. A balding man with a gray beard and hair, Joseph, and two younger people with blond hair stand around the woman, Mary, to our right, while a group of five young men or boys and three horses gather near the left edge. All the people have pale skin. Mary, the baby Jesus, Joseph, and the three men closest to them all have shimmering gold halos. One balding man with a long white beard kneels and kisses the baby’s feet. He wears a gold and crimson-red brocade-like robe over a burgundy-red garment, and he holds a pointed gold crown in his right hand, which rests on the ground. Behind him and to our left, a younger man with curly blond hair and goatee, wearing a wine-red tunic belted with gold and a gold crown on his head, holds his hands in prayer as he kneels down on one knee. The third stands to our left, cleanshaven with long blond hair. He wears a fur-lined, thigh-length scarlet-red robe and a gold crown, and he holds up a gold vessel in one hand. To our right, Mary wears a lapis-blue robe that covers her head and falls to her feet. The baby is covered only by a white cloth across his hips, and he has short blond hair. He touches the kneeling man’s head with one hand. His body is pudgy but his face has more adult-like, delicate features. Joseph stands at the woman’s far shoulder, wearing a butter-yellow robe over a rose-pink garment. His hands are gathered on a walking stick in front of his chest and his brows are furrowed with deep lines. One of the two younger people behind Mary, to our right, holds a lidded gold vessel. The group of five attendants to our left gather around cream-white, gray, or chestnut-brown horses. These blond people wear garments of dark olive-green, coral-red, royal-blue, or rose-pink tunics over black stockings. The rocky, brown cave behind Mary and Jesus, to our right of center, is occupied by a donkey and an ox behind a wooden trough. The landscape beyond is segmented into quilt-like squares of stylized crops. The horizon line comes almost to the top edge of the panel beneath a narrow strip of vivid, cobalt-blue sky. A gold star like a sunburst with rays of light hovers over the woman and child.

A woman with pale, smooth skin stands wearing a loosely draped, champagne-peach dress in this vertical portrait painting. Her body faces us but she turns her head to look down and off to our right with brown eyes. She has dark brows, an upturned nose, and her carnation-red lips are closed in a slight smile. Her ash-brown hair is loosely pulled up so it sweeps back from her face, while thick curls cascade down her neck and over her shoulders. Her long sleeved, floor-length dress is tied at her waist with a sage-green sash. Gossamer-white fabric drapes around her upper arms, and she holds the long ends in both hands. Her right elbow, to our left, rests on the high base of columns that rise behind her and off the top edge of the canvas. A rust-red curtain drapes down from the top of the painting, over the columns. To our right, beyond the columns, the landscape opens to a view of trees beneath a blue sky with white puffy clouds.

During Raphaelle Peale’s time, still lifes were relegated to the bottom of the hierarchy of painting subjects. Peale, however, ignored their low status and is now acknowledged as America’s first professional still-life painter and leading practitioner. In this particularly fine example, the rhythmic balance of fruit, nuts, and Chinese-export porcelain is enlivened by the diagonal branch of grapes becoming raisins and an orange leaf.

Procession or Pardon at Perros-Guirec

Giuliano de' Medici

The Merry Family

This vertical portrait shows the head, shoulders, and chest of a young man with smooth, pale skin and shoulder-length, dark blond hair positioned behind a narrow gray, stone ledge. Shown against a black background, the man tilts his head to our left and his eyes cut to our right. His left eyebrow, on our right, is slightly arched over brown eyes. He has a long, straight nose, pale pink lips, and his hair falls down the sides of his face from beneath a crimson-red, flat-topped cap. He wears a brown garment with white linen peeking through at the shoulder seams. The neck and seam down the front are lined with white, perhaps fur. He holds his right hand to his chest with his middle finger overlapping his ring finger.

Madonna and Child

BELLINI, Giovanni St Jerome Reading in the Countryside Oil on wood, 151 x 113 cm Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence

Une odalisque, dite La grande odalisque

Madonna and Child