The Nativity of the Virgin

c. 1400/1405

Andrea di Bartolo

Painter, Sienese, active from 1389 - died 1428

Under an arched structure, five women gather around a baby as two men sit outside the room in this vertical painting. All the people have pale skin with a faint greenish cast. The women have blond hair and the men have gray hair. To our right, a ruby-red curtain has been drawn back along the long side of a bed, and a woman there reclines propped on one elbow, facing into the room. She wears a white veil that covers her hair, neck, and shoulders and a sky-blue robe edged with gold over a navy-blue dress. Her head is encircled with a gold halo, and she looks down toward the baby at the center of the painting. Her wrists are crossed over a gold bowl, and an attendant standing next to the bed pours water from a gold pitcher over her hands. The attendant wears a forest-green dress and a white cloth is wrapped over her head. A pair of women sitting on the floor near the bed hold the infant, who has a gold halo around short, blond hair. Wrapped in a white cloth, the baby stands on the lap of one woman, who wears a rose-pink dress and a white cloth wrapped around her hair. The second woman in this pair, to our left, wears a golden yellow robe over a scarlet-red dress, and her braided hair is wound around her head. She holds both hands up in front of the baby, who looks at her, facing our left in profile. A gold bowl with a flaring foot sits on the floor in front of this trio. Coming through a darkened doorway behind them, a fifth woman wearing a topaz-blue dress enters carrying a gold dish. To our left, the two bearded men sit with their backs to the gray, stone wall enclosing the room with the women. The man closer to us has a long gray beard, and his wavy hair is surrounded by a gold halo. He looks to our left in profile and wears a rose-pink robe edged with gold, over a light blue garment. The second man angles his body toward his neighbor and gestures with one raised finger. The second man has a trimmed, gray beard and he wears a slate-blue robe over a butter-yellow garment. The structure enclosing the scene is made up of several arched openings that do not quite fit together to create a cohesive room. The upper, outer corners of the building are missing, as if in ruin. The background above is shiny gold that has been worn away in some areas to show the red layer underneath.

Media Options

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This painting presents the birth of the Virgin as a domestic tableau. Behind the parted red curtain of her bed, Mary’s mother, Anna, rests after giving birth. Her husband, Joachim, sits outside the bedchamber; his is no ordinary child, and he appears lost in thought, unaware of his companion. The infant Mary stands on sturdy legs supported and admired by two serving women, as another pours water from a pitcher so Anna can wash her hands. A fourth woman enters through the doorway, bringing a roasted chicken to the new mother. She looks out of the picture directly, drawing us into the scene. The emphasis on the human and the familiar—that chicken is almost in the center of the painting—made the Virgin and her family approachable to viewers and brought sacred events into the sphere of their own experience.

This and two other small paintings by Andrea di Bartolo at the National Gallery of Art, Joachim and Anna Giving Food to the Poor and Offerings to the Temple and The Presentation of the Virgin in the Temple, were all part of one altarpiece. They depict scenes from the childhood of the Virgin, and must have been joined originally by many other panels—now lost—illustrating episodes from Mary’s life. Because the surviving panels share vertical wood grain, scholars have theorized that they were probably all connected, one on top of another. We do not know what was featured on the center panel; it might have been an Annunciation, Mary’s coronation as Queen of Heaven, or another subject (see Reconstruction).

On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 3

Artwork overview

  • Medium

    tempera on poplar panel

  • Credit Line

    Samuel H. Kress Collection

  • Dimensions

    painted surface: 44.2 × 32.5 cm (17 3/8 × 12 13/16 in.)
    overall: 46.7 × 33.9 × 0.6 cm (18 3/8 × 13 3/8 × 1/4 in.)
    framed: 48.3 x 36.8 x 4.1 cm (19 x 14 1/2 x 1 5/8 in.)

  • Accession

    1939.1.42

Associated Artworks

Beneath two tall, tower-like structures, thirteen men, women, and children gather to give or receive food and foodstuff, all against a shiny gold background in this vertical painting. All the people have light skin tinged with green. To the left of center and under the left structure, an older, bearded man and woman have flat, round halos punched with rings of tiny circles. The man, Joachim, stands with his body angled to our left as he looks down to a group of five people gathered along the left edge of the painting. Joachim has shoulder-length, curly, gray hair and a long, wavy beard. His brow is furrowed and his lips closed. He wears a gold-trimmed, royal-blue, ankle-length robe and gray, pointed shoes. The handle of a basket holding bread rolls is hooked over one forearm, and he holds a roll out to the group with the other. In the group to our left, two people stand at the back while a man and a woman stoop over walking sticks, and the fifth person kneels as he holds a hand up toward Joachim. The kneeling person braces his other hand on a low crutch by his knee. The people here wear tattered and patched robes in fawn brown, moss green, ruby red, or tan. Just beyond Joachim’s shoulder, the woman with the halo, Anna, stands with her body angled in the opposite direction, to our right. She wears an ivory-white head covering that also wraps across her neck and shoulders, and an emerald-green, long-sleeved dress. She holds a rectangular object with a spout, presumably a vessel, in front of her body as she looks toward the group gathered to our right. Just across from her, under the right-hand structure, a bearded man with long, gray hair stands wearing a crimson-red, gold-edged cloak over a long white robe. He also wears a conical, pointed white headpiece with a gold crown around its base. The man holds out one hand to the three boys gathered between him and Anna. The boys wear togas in rose pink or marigold orange, and they hold two tall, white sacks. Also under the right-hand tower and along the right edge of the composition, two more bearded men stand close together, gesturing toward each other as if in conversation. Each structure has a back wall leading up to a box-like second story, which is supported at the front with thin columns. The left structure has a dark, arched opening behind Joachim and Anna, a pumpkin-orange ceiling underneath the second story, and arched openings on that second level. The structure to our right has arched openings supporting a vaulted ceiling, painted with gold stars on a navy-blue background. A narrow, crenelated, slate-gray wall connects the two structures. Areas of red, especially around cracks, show through the shimmering gold background above and around the structures.

Joachim and Anna Giving Food to the Poor and Offerings to the Temple

Andrea di Bartolo

1400

More About this Artwork

Scholarly Article:  Italian Paintings of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries: The Nativity of the Virgin, c. 1400/1405

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

This panel, along with NGA 1939.1.41 and 1939.1.43, are stated to have come from the collection of a contessa Giustiniani, Genoa;[1] (Count Alessandro Contini Bonacossi, Rome); sold July 1930 to the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, New York;[2] gift 1939 to NGA.
[1] See the bill of sale described in note 2. No documented collection of the conti Giustiniani at Genoa seems to have existed, at least in the early years of the twentieth century. The works that Elisabeth Gardner (_ A Bibliographical Repertory of Italian Private Collections_, ed. Chiara Ceschi and Katharine Baetjer, 4 vols., Vicenza, 1998-2011: 2(2002):183) cites as formerly the property of the contessa Giustiniani almost all seem to have been purchased on the art market shortly before 1930, when Contini Bonacossi sold them to Samuel H. Kress. The contessa is thus more likely to have been a dealer, or agent, than a collector. See also Miklós Boskovits and David Alan Brown, Italian Paintings of the Fifteenth Century, National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue, Washington and New York, 2003: 616 n. 3.
[2] The painting is included on a bill of sale dated 15 July 1930 that included eight paintings from the Giustiniani collection (copy in NGA curatorial files); see also The Kress Collection Digital Archive, https://kress.nga.gov/Detail/objects/2260.

Associated Names

Bibliography

1941

  • Preliminary Catalogue of Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1941: 3, no. 153.

  • National Gallery of Art. Book of Illustrations. Washington, 1941: 51 (repro.), 236.

1942

  • Book of Illustrations. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1942: 242, repro. 53.

1949

  • Brandi, Cesare. Quattrocentisti senesi. Milan, 1949: 243, pl. 9.

1955

  • Ferguson, George. Signs and Symbols in Christian Art. 2nd ed. New York, 1955: pl. 21.

1959

  • Paintings and Sculpture from the Samuel H. Kress Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1959: 36, repro.

1964

  • Mojzer, Miklós. "Vier sienesische Quattrocento-Tafeln des Christlichen Museums zu Esztergom." Pantheon 22 (1964): 1, 2 (repro.), 6 n. 5.

1965

  • Summary Catalogue of European Paintings and Sculpture. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1965: 7.

  • Boskovits, Miklós, Miklós Mojzer, and András Mucsi. Das Christliche Museum von Esztergom (Gran). Budapest, 1965: 44.

  • Boskovits, Miklós, Miklós Mojzer, András Mucsi, Alfréd Schiller, Elizabeth Hoch, and Susanna Horn. Christian Art in Hungary: Collections from the Esztergom Christian Museum. Budapest, 1965: 52.

1966

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Paintings from the Samuel H. Kress Collection: Italian Schools, XIII-XV Century. London, 1966: 65-66, fig. 176.

  • Schiller, Gertrud. Ikonographie der christlichen Kunst. 6 vols. Gütersloh, 1966-1990: 4, pt. 2:64, 65, 71, 246, 316, fig. 520.

  • Boskovits, Miklós. Early Italian Panel Paintings. Budapest, 1966: 40.

1968

  • National Gallery of Art. European Paintings and Sculpture, Illustrations. Washington, 1968: 1, repro.

  • Berenson, Bernard. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance. Central Italian and North Italian Schools. 3 vols. London, 1968: 1:8.

1971

  • Carli, Enzo. I pittori senesi. Siena, 1971: 138, fig. 123.

  • Os, Hendrik W. van. "Andrea di Bartolo’s Assumption of the Virgin." Arts in Virginia 2 (1971): 4.

1972

  • Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass., 1972: 7, 300, 645.

1975

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Summary Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1975: 12, repro.

  • Mucsi, András. Katalog der Alten Gemäldegalerie des Christlichen Museums zu Esztergom. Budapest, 1975: 42.

1979

  • Shapley, Fern Rusk. Catalogue of the Italian Paintings. 2 vols. Washington, 1979: 1:4-5; 2:pl. 3.

1981

  • Carli, Enzo. La pittura senese del Trecento. 1st ed. Milan, 1981: 238, fig. 279.

1982

  • Il gotico a Siena: miniature, pitture, oreficerie, oggetti d’arte. Exh. cat. Palazzo Pubblico, Siena. Florence, 1982: 313, 317.

1983

  • L’Art gothique siennois: enluminure, peinture, orfèvrerie, sculpture. Exh. cat. Musée du Petit Palais, Avignon. Florence, 1983: 280, 284.

  • Kasten, Eberhard. "Andrea di Bartolo." In Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon: Die bildenden Künstler aller Zeiten und Völker. Edited by Günter Meissner. 3 vols. Leipzig, 1983-1990: 2(1986):974, 976.

1984

  • Walker, John. National Gallery of Art, Washington. Rev. ed. New York, 1984: 82, no. 38, color repro.

1985

  • European Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1985: 18, repro.

1986

  • Kanter, Laurence B. "Giorgio di Andrea di Bartolo." Arte cristiana 74 (1986): 21-22, 24, repro. 26.

  • Maderna, Valentina, ed. Il polittico di Andrea di Bartolo a Brera Restaurato. Exh. cat. Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan. Florence, 1986: 17.

1988

  • Gurrieri, Francesco, and Luciano Bellosi, eds. La Sede storica del Monte dei Paschi di Siena: vicende costruttive e opere d’arte. Florence, 1988: 276.

1991

  • Chelazzi Dini, Giulietta. "Andrea di Bartolo." In Enciclopedia dell’arte medievale. Edited by Istituto della Enciclopedia italiana. 12 vols. Rome, 1991-2002: 1(1991):595.

1992

  • Kasten, Eberhard. "Andrea di Bartolo." In Allgemeines Künstlerlexikon: Die bildenden Künstler aller Zeiten und Völker. Edited by Günter Meissner. 87+ vols. Munich and Leipzig, 1992+: 3(1992):512, 514.

1994

  • Lorentz, Philippe. "De Sienne a Strasbourg: posterité d’une composition d’Ambrogio Lorenzetti, la Nativité de la Vierge de l’Hôpital Santa Maria della Scala à Sienne." In Hommage à Michel Laclotte: Etudes sur la peinture du Moyen Age et de la Renaissance. Edited by Luciano Bellosi, Pierre Rosenberg, Cécile Scailliérz, and Dominique Thiébault. Milan and Paris, 1994: 125 (repro.), 126, 127, 130-131 n. 45.

1997

  • Chelazzi Dini, Giulietta, Alessandro Angelini, and Bernardina Sani. Sienese Painting From Duccio to the Birth of the Baroque. New York, 1997: 200-201.

  • Chelazzi Dini, Giulietta. "La cosidetta crisi della metà del Trecento (1348-1390)." In Pittura senese. Edited by Giulietta Chelazzi Dini, Alessandro Angelini and Bernardina Sani. 1st ed. Milan, 1997: 200.

1998

  • Frinta, Mojmír S. Punched Decoration on Late Medieval Panel and Miniature Painting. Prague, 1998: 69.

2009

  • Bellosi, Luciano, et al., eds. La collezione Salini: dipinti, sculture e oreficerie dei secoli XII, XIII, XIV e XV. 4 vols. Florence, 2009, 2015: 1(2009):238.

2016

  • Boskovits, Miklós. Italian Paintings of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries. The Systematic Catalogue of the National Gallery of Art. Washington, 2016: 14-25, color repro.

Wikidata ID

Q20173368

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