Madonna and Child Enthroned (c. 1350): Art, History and Details

Madonna and Child Enthroned (c. 1350) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Master of San Lucchese (Italian, c. 1335–1380).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Seated on an elaborate throne, the Madonna’s weighty majesty emphasizes her role as the Queen of Heaven as she gazes at her infant son. The child, in turn, stares at the viewer. To Christ’s right is a fluttering goldfinch, a bird that was believed to nest in thorny trees and, according to legend, removed a painful spine from Christ’s crown of thorns. At that moment, a drop of his blood fell onto the goldfinch, forever giving it red markings. The precise identity of this artist has not yet been discovered, and little is known about his training or career. He receives his name after an altarpiece in the church of San Lucchese in Poggibonsi, near Siena.

Object facts

• Title: Madonna and Child Enthroned
• Date: c. 1350
• Creator attribution: Master of San Lucchese (Italian, c. 1335–1380)
• Culture: Italy
• Type: Painting
• Technique: tempera and gold on poplar panel
• Dimensions: Framed: 122.5 x 61 x 7.5 cm (48 1/4 x 24 x 2 15/16 in.); Unframed: 113.7 x 54 cm (44 3/4 x 21 1/4 in.)
• Collection: MED - Medieval Art
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1968.206

Collection credit

Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.
• Lee, Sherman E. “The Year in Review for 1968.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 56, no. 1 (January 1969): 3–50.
• Fahy, Everett. “A Masterpiece of Early Italian Painting.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 56, no. 10 (December 1969): 348–353.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.