Virgin and Child with Saints (c. 1230s): Art, History and Details

Virgin and Child with Saints (c. 1230s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Berlinghiero (Italian, before 1242).

The work and its context

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

This small altarpiece, intended for a domestic interior or private chapel, consists of three panels, allowing it to be folded and easily transported. Surrounding the Virgin and Child in the center are various saints. On the left is Saint Andrew crucified, with St. Francis and St. Paul below; on the right, Christ with the instruments of the Passion, and St. Stephen and St. Lawrence below. The long expressive lines that define the clothing and hands of the figures are typical of Byzantine painting, which spread from Constantinople to Italy in the Middle Ages. Berlinghiero is one of the earliest Italian painters known by name. He lived in Lucca, the most important artistic center in Tuscany before the rise of Siena and Florence. Berlinghiero headed a large, influential workshop that included his sons.

Object facts

• Title: Virgin and Child with Saints
• Date: c. 1230s
• Creator attribution: Berlinghiero (Italian, before 1242)
• Culture: Italy
• Type: Painting
• Technique: triptych (tabernacle); tempera and gold on poplar panel
• Dimensions: Overall: 42.6 x 51.5 cm (16 3/4 x 20 1/4 in.); Center: 42.8 x 27 cm (16 7/8 x 10 5/8 in.); Left: 42.5 x 12.5 cm (16 3/4 x 4 15/16 in.); Right: 42.4 x 12 cm (16 11/16 x 4 3/4 in.)
• Collection: MED - Medieval Art
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1966.237

A detail from the museum

This tabernacle was recognized as being by Berlinghiero while in the the collection of Adolphe Stoclet, a wealthy Belgian engineer and collector.

Collection credit

Gift of the John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust

Further reading listed by the museum

• Garrison, Jr., Edward B. "A Berlinghieresque Fresco in St. Stefano, Bologna," The Art Bulletin XXVIII (1946).
• Offner, Richard, and Klara Steinweg. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. 3,5, 3,5. Florence: Giunti, 1947.
• Garrison, Jr. Edward B. "Post-War Discoveries- III: The Madonna di Sotto gli Organi," Burlington Magazine LXXXIX (October 1947).

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.