Madonna and Child with the Infant John the Baptist

Bernardino di Betto, known as il Pinturicchio
tempera on panel
1490-1495

At the end of the 19th Century, this artwork belonged to the noble Theodoli family, residing on Piazza del Parlamento in Rome. In 1898 the painting was ceded and acquired by Lukas Schumacher, the Viennese painter and art collector. The work remained in Vienna until it was put on sale by the Dorotheum auction house on the 24th April 2007 and then acquired by the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio di Perugia.

With a composition similar to that of Madonna che insegna a leggere al Bambino (Madonna with the Christ Child Writing) in the Philadelphia Mueum of Art, this work can be dated to 1490-1495. Like in the piece in Philadelphia, the Virgin and the Child group is framed by two trees which poetically articulate the space. The high horizon line provides ample space for the scenery. As a master of “minuta artigianeria” [meticulous artistry] in Federico Zeri’s happy phraseology, the painter shows an immense attention to detail and skilfully analytical description.

A recurrent aspect of the artist’s production, surely derived from his miniaturist style, are the bright chromatic tones of his kaleidoscopic palette. Infrared reflectography, conducted in the course of the piece’s most recent restoration work, has revealed the artwork was completed at one go, without recourse to a stencil or preparatory drawing.