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拍品专文
This panel, which must have been the central element of a portable triptych, has been recognised since 1949 as by Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrogio. Pietro di Giovanni was the closest associate of Sassetta, the greatest painter of quattrocento Siena, and evolved a personal style that anticipated in a number of respects the taste of other Sienese artists who emerged in the 1440s and the ensuing decade.
The panel is most directly comparable with the central element of the portable triptych by Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrogio now in the Salini collection in the Castello di Gallico, near Siena (exhibited at Siena, 2010, op. cit., no. C.26), although it is slightly larger than that panel, which, including the frame element, is 50 centimetres high. The two are similar in layout -- with the Crucifixion in the pinnacle above the arched main compartment -- in the structure of the compositions, in tonality and in the character of the types, and identical in the halo pattern of the saints. But Pietro was clearly determined to introduce subtle variations between the two. In the Salini picture, the enthroned Virgin sits on an altar above a step, which, as here, echoes that of the frontal step which established the compositional plane of the picture: She looks to the left, but the Child pulls forward to the right, His head and left arm corresponding closely with those in this panel. The saints are in the same positions as in this panel, Saints John the Baptist and Bartholomew in front, Saint Anthony Abbot and the as yet uncanonised Bernardino behind, their gaze directed in the same way. But the angels, who hold the cloth of honour behind the throne and support the Virgin's crown, have white drapery on their arms and look at one another in the Salini picture. In the Crucifixion at Gallico, the lower part of Christ's body hangs to the right, rather than to the left, the grieving Virgin clasps her hands about her knees, and is balanced by the Magdalene rather than Saint John the Evangelist. Nor do the similarities end here. Close parallels for the heads of the female saints can be cited in, for example, that of the Virgin Annunciate on the right wing of the Salini triptych and in the full-length saints of the left wing. The relationship of the two pictures indeed shows how subtly the artist could arrange and rearrange components within what is a very effective compositional structure. The Salini triptych is datable between 1444, the year of Bernardino's beatification, and the artist's death in 1449, and this panel must be closely coeval with this, and may well indeed have been executed almost simultaneously.
The panel is most directly comparable with the central element of the portable triptych by Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrogio now in the Salini collection in the Castello di Gallico, near Siena (exhibited at Siena, 2010, op. cit., no. C.26), although it is slightly larger than that panel, which, including the frame element, is 50 centimetres high. The two are similar in layout -- with the Crucifixion in the pinnacle above the arched main compartment -- in the structure of the compositions, in tonality and in the character of the types, and identical in the halo pattern of the saints. But Pietro was clearly determined to introduce subtle variations between the two. In the Salini picture, the enthroned Virgin sits on an altar above a step, which, as here, echoes that of the frontal step which established the compositional plane of the picture: She looks to the left, but the Child pulls forward to the right, His head and left arm corresponding closely with those in this panel. The saints are in the same positions as in this panel, Saints John the Baptist and Bartholomew in front, Saint Anthony Abbot and the as yet uncanonised Bernardino behind, their gaze directed in the same way. But the angels, who hold the cloth of honour behind the throne and support the Virgin's crown, have white drapery on their arms and look at one another in the Salini picture. In the Crucifixion at Gallico, the lower part of Christ's body hangs to the right, rather than to the left, the grieving Virgin clasps her hands about her knees, and is balanced by the Magdalene rather than Saint John the Evangelist. Nor do the similarities end here. Close parallels for the heads of the female saints can be cited in, for example, that of the Virgin Annunciate on the right wing of the Salini triptych and in the full-length saints of the left wing. The relationship of the two pictures indeed shows how subtly the artist could arrange and rearrange components within what is a very effective compositional structure. The Salini triptych is datable between 1444, the year of Bernardino's beatification, and the artist's death in 1449, and this panel must be closely coeval with this, and may well indeed have been executed almost simultaneously.