Madonna and Child with Five Angels

c. 1335

Giovanni Baronzio

Painter, Italian, active c. 1320 - 1350

A woman holding a baby sits on a throne in front of a cloth held up by five winged angels in this vertical painting. The woman, baby, and angels all have pale skin tinged with gray, long, straight noses, narrow mouths, almond-shaped eyes, and gold halos. The woman sits with her knees and shoulders squared to us. She looks at us with light brown eyes, and her head tips slightly to the right, toward the baby. A white veil drapes over her head and shoulders, and she wears a slate-blue dress under a teal-green robe, which is lined with pale, spring green. Gold lines densely spaced across the dress and robe suggest folds and wrinkles. She supports the baby’s bottom with her left hand, to our right. He sits upright with his knees and body angled to our left. He reaches up with his right hand, to our left, to touch the woman’s veil, and the other hand rests on an oversized cricket in his lap. He wears a transparent white garment edged with gold and a marigold yellow and coral orange cloth wrapped across his lap over bare feet. His features are small in a round face. He has brown hair, and his hairline is high. The cloth behind the pair is patterned with gray, brick red, and gold. Two angels hold up each long side and one holds up the top. The angels all look in or down. They have brown hair, and wings and robes in shades of golden yellow, pale peach, and celestial blue. The throne has a blocky seat, and the base projects in a semicircle against the navy-blue floor. There are lion finials at the front of each arm. The background is gilded with a leafy pattern in gleaming gold. The upper corners and some areas along the edges are damaged.

Media Options

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This large painting of the Madonna and Child was in the center of an altarpiece devoted to Saint John the Baptist, which also featured The Baptism of Christ and The Birth, Naming, and Circumcision of Saint John the Baptist (see Reconstruction). The altarpiece’s original location is not known, though it was probably featured in a church dedicated to the saint in what is today the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna, close to Giovanni Baronzio’s home in Rimini. No documents pertaining to the altarpiece have ever been found. It must have been dismantled by the mid-19th century, when components of it began to appear on the art market. The dispersed parts have been linked to each other through various clues: similar dimensions, related subject matter, the artist’s style, and particular details of technique and execution.

The style of Giovanni Baronzio was influenced by the innovations of Giotto, who had worked in Rimini, and here we see Baronzio trying to give similar volume to his figures. The gold striations of the Virgin’s robe may be a convention of Byzantine art, and they also work as contours to mold the body below. The decorative effects found in all the paintings from the altarpiece also point to Baronzio. Note the painstakingly patterned cloth of honor, the brocade design of the background, and the elaborately tooled halos. Evidence of Baronzio’s fondness for striking color manifests itself in Jesus’s red drapery and the bright green lining of Mary’s robe. Finally, there is a certain playfulness among the angels, almost in a game of hide-and-seek, characteristic of Baronzio’s delight in lively narrative detail.

On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 1

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    tempera on panel

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    painted surface: 100.6 × 48.2 cm (39 5/8 × 19 in.)
    overall: 102.3 × 49.3 × 3.7 cm (40 1/4 × 19 7/16 × 1 7/16 in.)
    framed: 138.4 x 70.1 cm (54 1/2 x 27 5/8 in.)

  • Accession

    1943.4.45

Associated Artworks

A nude man, Jesus, stands with hands together in prayer, hip-deep in a stylized river with a bearded man wearing a fur-like garment on a rocky bank to one side and two winged angels on the other, all against a gleaming gold background in this vertical painting. Another bearded man wearing a white robe floats in a blue field at the top center of the panel. All the people have pale skin, brown hair, and gold halos encircle their heads. At the center of the painting, Jesus’s body is angled to our left, and he tips his head the same direction. Jesus has shoulder-length hair and a trimmed beard. Slate-blue water reaching his hips is painted with regular, white, curving lines to suggest flowing water. Standing on the flat top of a tan-colored rock to our left, the other man head has raggedy, darker brown hair and a fuller beard. His brow is furrowed, and he has dark eyes. He wears the brown, fur-like garment under a white robe. He steps forward on his left foot, farther from us, to touch Jesus’s head with his right hand, and he holds a staff in his other hand. To our right, the angels stand side-by-side facing Jesus. The angel farther from us wears indigo blue and the one closer to us wears a brick-red, patterned, long robe over bare feet. A swath of beige, geometrically patterned fabric drapes over that angel’s arm, whose hands are also held together in prayer. Their wings darken from cream-white at the top to golden yellow, then burnt orange at the bottom. Stylized trees, one to our left and two to our right, grow from the rocky hills beyond the people. In a half-circle at the top, a man smaller in scale hovers, chest down, over the scene. He lifts his right hand toward Jesus and holds a book with a crimson-red cover with his other hand. The semi-circle fades from deep teal at the center to pale aquamarine blue at the outer edge, and is painted with gold starbursts. The entire scene has a gold border with clover-like forms set within diamonds along the inner edge of the panel.

The Baptism of Christ

Giovanni Baronzio

1335

About a dozen women, babies, and men gather in small groups across interior spaces with a bedroom to one side and a covered space to the other in this vertical panel painting. The women have nearly white-colored skin, and the men and children have pale skin, sometimes tinged with gray. The bed spans the left two-thirds of the composition. A woman lies under a vibrant red coverlet and white sheets pulled up to her chest. A white veil covers her head, forehead, and neck, and she wears a white, long-sleeved gown. Her shoulders rest up on pillows, and her head is surrounded by a shiny gold halo. A pale face by the woman’s feet looks through an opening at the base of the bed. Two women on the far side of the bed wear green or blue dresses and white head coverings. They both attend to a swaddled blond baby, who also has a gold halo. The wall behind the bed is patterned with an intricate geometric design in grass green and brown. The space above the bed is shiny gold punched with a leafy pattern. The wall is capped with an entablature held up with corbels. A balcony space rises to the left, and a structure with arched openings is to our right. A deep bench runs parallel to the bed along the bottom edge of the painting, closer to us. A balding man with a gray beard sits there and writes, brows deeply furrowed, on a scroll braced on one knee. If complete, writing on the scroll would read “NOMEN EST IOHANNES.” He wears a blue robe under a pale pink cloak, and he has a halo. A man standing just to our right of the seated man gestures toward the first with both hands. This second man has a brown beard and long hair and wears a marigold orange cloak over red robes. A bearded man with gray hair standing behind him wears leaf green and looks to our right. Four men and a haloed baby crowd in the covered space to our right. The man wearing green is shown again, now holding the nude baby. The man with brown hair now wears white vestments and cuts foreskin of the baby’s penis. Two other two men look on, and a sliver of an orange cap indicates that a fifth person is at the back of the crowd. The covered space is ivory-white and has a balcony above the taller, lower level. The whole panel is edged by gold patterned with a clover-like design.

The Birth, Naming, and Circumcision of Saint John the Baptist

Giovanni Baronzio

1335

More About this Artwork

Scholarly Article:  Italian Paintings of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries: Madonna and Child with Five Angels, c. 1335

This horizontal painting is made up of three parts: in the center square panel, a woman reclines under a wooden shelter set into a rocky cave, which is surrounded by angels, and narrower wings to either side are each occupied by a standing man. All the people have pale skin, which is tinged with faint green. The three panels are joined with a gold frame, and the gold background behind the central scene and the men in the side panels are covered with a noticeable network of cracks. In the central panel, a cobalt-blue robe nearly envelopes the reclining woman’s body; this is Mary. It covers her head and falls open where she crosses her wrists over her chest to show a pink garment underneath. A flat gold halo encircles her head ,and her body is surrounded by a field of crimson red, almost like an aura. She rests under a wooden structure with a pitched roof, which is surrounded by craggy, barren rock. A swaddled infant lies in a rectangular, tray-like manger. The infant’s head is also surrounded by a gold halo. Fine gold rays emanate down into the structure from a star just above the peak of the roof. A bull and a donkey look down at the baby from the far side of the manger. The interior of the structure behind them is black. In a smaller scale, two women wash a haloed infant in a tub in front of the rocky cave near the lower left corner of this panel. A man with a white beard and hair sits to our left of Mary, holding a pink cloak at his throat and looking toward the infant. Above and around the rocks, seven winged and haloed angels cluster on each side. One angel to the right presents a scroll with black writing to two men accompanied by a dog and several sheep in the lower right. The man in the panel to the left, Isaiah, has a gray beard and long, wavy hair, and he wears a lilac-purple cloak draped over a coral-orange robe. In his right hand, on our left, he holds an unfurled scroll with large black lettering. His other hand is raised with one finger pointing upward. He looks to our left, away from the central scene. On the right, Ezekiel, echoes Isaiah's pose. Ezekiel holds an open scroll with his left hand, on our right, and his other hand is raised. He also wears a coral-colored robe, but his is overlaid with a blue cloak. His receding hair is short and brown, as is his beard. Like Isaiah, he takes up most of the height of the panel and gazes to our left, toward the central panel.

Scholarly Series:  Italian Paintings of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Possibly commissioned as part of the high altarpiece of a church dedicated to Saint John the Baptist in Emilia Romagna or in the Marche, Italy. Léon Ouroussoff [1877-1933], Vienna and later, Monte Carlo and Cannes, early twentieth century;[1] purchased February 1920 by Edward Fowles for (Duveen Brothers, Inc., London, New York, and Paris);[2] sold to Otto H. Kahn [1867-1934], New York, by 1924; by inheritance to his wife, Addie Wolff Kahn [d. 1949], New York; sold 18 January 1937 to (Duveen Brothers, Inc., London, New York, and Paris);[3] sold 1942 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[4] gift 1943 to NGA.
[1] Léon Ourousoff had been Russian ambassador in Vienna. In the years after World War I his collection was reported to be both in Cannes and in Monte Carlo.
[2] Duveen Brothers Records, accession number 960015, Research Library, Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles: reel 422.
[3] Edward Fowles, Memories of Duveen Brothers, London, 1976: 124, describes Otto Kahn’s acquisition of the panel from Duveen Brothers and its sale back to the company by Kahn’s widow. See also Duveen Brothers Records: reel 79, box 224, folder 7; reel 328, box 473, folder 2.
[4] See also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/1360.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1924

  • Loan Exhibition of Important Early Italian Paintings in the Possession of Notable American Collectors, Duveen Brothers, New York, 1924, no. 9, as by Giovanni Baronzio (no. 33 in illustrated 1926 version of catalogue).

1940

  • Arts of the Middle Ages: A Loan Exhibition, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1940, no. 57, as The Virgin and Child Enthroned.

1946

  • Recent Additions to the Kress Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1946, no. 711.

1995

  • Il Trecento Riminese: Maestri e botteghe tra Romagna e Marche, Museo della Città, Rimini, Italy, 1995-1996, no. 50, repro.

Bibliography

1924

  • Offner, Richard. "A Remarkable Exhibition of Italian Paintings." The Arts 5 (1924): 240 (repro.), 245.

1925

  • McCormick, William B. "Otto H. Kahn Collection." International Studio 80 (1925): 280 (repro.), 286.

1926

  • Valentiner, Wilhelm R. A Catalogue of Early Italian Paintings Exhibited at the Duveen Galleries, April to May 1924. New York, 1926: n.p., no. 33, repro.

1928

  • Lehman, Robert. The Philip Lehman Collection, New York: Paintings. Paris, 1928: no. LXXIV, repro.

1931

  • Venturi, Lionello. Pitture italiane in America. Milan, 1931: no. 92, repro.

1932

  • Berenson, Bernard. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance: A List of the Principal Artists and Their Works with an Index of Places. Oxford, 1932: 44.

1933

  • Venturi, Lionello. Italian Paintings in America. Translated by Countess Vanden Heuvel and Charles Marriott. 3 vols. New York and Milan, 1933: 1:no. 113, repro.

1935

  • Salmi, Mario. "La scuola di Rimini, 3." Rivista del R. Istituto d'archeologia e storia dell’arte 5 (1935): 112, 113 (repro.), 115, 125 n. 22.

  • Brandi, Cesare, ed. Mostra della pittura riminese del Trecento. Exh. cat. Palazzo dell'Arengo, Rimini, 1935: xxii-xxiii, 212 fig. 140.

1936

  • Berenson, Bernard. Pitture italiane del rinascimento: catalogo dei principali artisti e delle loro opere con un indice dei luoghi. Translated by Emilio Cecchi. Milan, 1936: 37.

  • Brandi, Cesare. "Conclusioni su alcuni discussi problemi della pittura riminese del Trecento." Critica d’arte 1 (1936): 231 n. 18, 236-237.

  • Salmi, Mario. "Review of Conclusioni su alcuni discussi problemi della pittura riminese del Trecento by Cesare Brandi." Rivista d’arte 18 (1936): 413.

1940

  • Arts of the Middle Ages 1000-1400. A Loan Exhibition. Exh. cat. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1940: 20.

  • Frankfurter, Alfred M. "Medieval Style in Painting." Art News 38 (1940): 14, repro.

1941

  • Coletti, Luigi. I Primitivi. 3 vols. Novara, 1941-1947: 3(1947):xix, lxix n. 34, pl. 33.

1944

  • Frankfurter, Alfred M. The Kress Collection in the National Gallery. New York, 1944: 17, repro., as by Giovanni Baronzio.

1945

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1945 (reprinted 1947, 1949): 10, repro., as by Giovanni Baronzio.

  • "The New Kress Gift to the National Gallery, Washington." The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs 86, no. 504 (1945): 55.

1946

  • Douglas, Robert Langton. "Recent Additions to the Kress Collection." The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs 88 (1946): repro. 84.

1947

  • Sandberg-Vavalà, Evelyn. "A Madonna by Giovanni Baronzio." The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs 89 (1947): 32, n. 11.

1951

  • Galetti, Ugo, and Ettore Camesasca. Enciclopedia della pittura italiana. 3 vols. Milan, 1951: 1:209 repro.

  • Toesca, Pietro. Il Trecento. Storia dell’arte italiana, 2. Turin, 1951: 730.

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Kress Collection Acquired by the Samuel H. Kress Foundation 1945-1951. Introduction by John Walker, text by William E. Suida. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1951: 36.

1954

  • Shorr, Dorothy C. The Christ Child in Devotional Images in Italy During the XIV Century. New York, 1954: 75 n. 27, 109 n. 3, 122.

  • Suida, Wilhelm. European Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. Seattle, 1954: 14.

1957

  • Exposition de la Collection Lehman de New York. Exh. cat. Musée de l’Orangerie, Paris, 1957: 31-32.

1959

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 26, repro.

  • Lazarev, Viktor Nikitič. Proischoždenie italʹjanskogo vozroždenija. Vol. 2 (of 3), Iskusstvo trečento. Moscow, 1959: 222, repro. 487.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 86.

  • Volpe, Carlo. La pittura riminese del Trecento. Milan, 1965: 38-39, 80, fig. 181.

1966

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XIII-XV Century. London, 1966: 68, fig. 183.

1967

  • Klesse, Brigitte. Seidenstoffe in der italienischen Malerei des 14. Jahrhunderts. Bern, 1967: 64, 213, 281.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 75, repro.

  • Berenson, Bernard. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance. Central Italian and North Italian Schools. 3 vols. London, 1968: 1:362.

1970

  • Seymour, Charles. Early Italian Paintings in the Yale University Art Gallery. New Haven and London, 1970: 108.

1971

  • Kiel, Hanna. "Review of Antologia di dipinti di cinque secoli, Circolo delle Stampe, Palazzo Serbelloni." Pantheon 29 (1971): 345.

1972

  • Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass., 1972: 130, 646.

1975

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 222, repro.

  • Szabó, George. The Robert Lehman Collection: A Guide. New York, 1975: 25.

1976

  • Fowles, Edward. Memories of Duveen Brothers. London, 1976: 124-125.

1979

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. National Gallery of Art. 2 vols. Washington, 1979: 1:316; 2:pl. 229.

  • Zuliani, Fulvio. "Tommaso da Modena." In Tomaso da Modena: catalogo. Edited by Luigi Menegazzi. Exh. cat. Convento di Santa Caterina, Capitolo dei Dominicani, Treviso, 1979: 105 n. 9.

1982

  • Christiansen, Keith. "Fourteenth-Century Italian Altarpieces." Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art 40 (1982): 42, repro. 45.

1984

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 67, no. 4, color repro.

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 255, repro.

1986

  • Castelnuovo, Enrico, ed. La Pittura in Italia. Il Duecento e il Trecento. Essays by Andrea Bacchi and Daniele Benati. 2 vols. Milan, 1986: 1;208; 2:611.

1987

  • Pope-Hennessy, John, and Laurence B. Kanter. The Robert Lehman Collection. Vol. 1, Italian Paintings. New York, 1987: 86, repro. 289.

1989

  • "Maestro della Vita del Battista." In Dizionario della pittura e dei pittori. Edited by Enrico Castelnuovo and Bruno Toscano. 6 vols. Turin, 1989-1994: 3(1992):430.

1990

  • Pasini, Pier Giorgio. La pittura riminese del Trecento. Cinisello Balsamo (Milan), 1990: repro. 127.

1991

  • Freuler, Gaudenz, ed. Manifestatori delle cose miracolose: arte italiana del ’300 e ’400 da collezioni in Svizzera e nel Liechtenstein. Exh. cat. Villa Favorita, Fondazione Thyssen-Bornemisza, Lugano-Castagnola. Einsiedeln, 1991: 132.

  • Benati, Daniele. "Baronzio, Giovanni." In Enciclopedia dell’arte medievale. Edited by Istituto della Enciclopedia italiana. 12 vols. Rome, 1991-2002: 3(1992):121.

1992

  • Mancinelli, Fabrizio. "I dipinti della Pinacoteca dall’XI al XV secolo." In Pinacoteca Vaticana: nella pittura l’espressione del messaggio divino nella luce la radice della creazione pittorica. Edited by Umberto Baldini. Milan, 1992: 162-163.

  • Hornig, Christian. "Baronzio Giovanni." In Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon: Die bildenden Künstler aller Zeiten und Völker. Edited by Günter Meissner. 87+ vols. Munich and Leipzig, 1992+: 7(1993):135.

1993

  • Boskovits, Miklós. "Per la storia della pittura tra la Romagna e le Marche ai primi del ’300." Arte cristiana 81 (1993): 168-169.

1994

  • Rossi, Francesco. Catalogo della Pinacoteca Vaticana, 3. Il Trecento: Umbria, Marche, Italia del Nord. Vatican City, 1994: 113-118, fig. 155.

1995

  • Baetjer, Katharine. European Paintings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born before 1865. A Summary Catalogue. New York, 1995: 110.

  • Benati, Daniele, ed. Il Trecento riminese: Maestri e botteghe tra Romagna e Marche. Exh. cat. Museo della città, Rimini. Milan, 1995: 47, 55, 56 n. 3, 264, repro. 265, 266, repro. 268.

1996

  • Tambini, Anna. "In margine alla pittura riminese del Trecento." Studi romagnoli 47 (1996): 466.

1998

  • Frinta, Mojmír S. Punched Decoration on Late Medieval Panel and Miniature Painting. Prague, 1998: 152, 164.

2002

  • Ragionieri, Giovanna. "Baronzio, Giovanni." In La pittura in Europa. Il Dizionario dei pittori. Edited by Carlo Pirovano. 3 vols. Milan, 2002: 1:53.

2004

  • Secrest, Meryle. Duveen: A Life in Art. New York, 2004: 409.

2005

  • Laclotte, Michel, and Esther Moench. Peinture italienne: Musée du Petit Palais, Avignon. Paris, 2005: 63.

2006

  • Morozzi, Luisa. "Da Lasinio a Sterbini: ‘primitivi’ in una raccolta romana di secondo Ottocento." In AEIMNEΣTOΣ. Miscellanea di studi per Mauro Cristofani. 2 vols. Edited by Benedetta Adembri. Florence, 2006: 2:912, 916 n. 50.

  • Benati, Daniele. "Il Dossale Corvisieri nel percorso di Giovanni Baronzio." L’Arco 4 (2006): 27.

2008

  • Ferrara, Daniele, ed. Giovanni Baronzio e la pittura a Rimini nel Trecento. Exh. cat. Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Antica, Rome. Cinisello Balsamo (near Milan), 2008: 31, 106.

2016

  • Boskovits, Miklós. Italian Paintings of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries. The Systematic Catalogue of the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 2016: 162-175, color repro.

Inscriptions

on the Madonna's halo: AVE.MARIA.GRAT[IA].PLENA.D[OMI]N[U]S: (Hail, Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee; from Luke 1:28)

Wikidata ID

Q20173114

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