Provenance

Henry George Charles Lascelles, 6th earl of Harewood

1882 - 1947

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A winged, blond angel kneels facing our right in profile wearing a gold garment, and is shown against a gold background in this vertical painting. The textured robe the angel wears is a similar color to the background, and with the golden hair and wings, the painting is almost entirely gold. The angel’s pale skin has a greenish cast but the cheeks are rosy. Blond hair curls around the face and falls over the shoulders. The angel looks to our right with slitted eyes over a long, straight nose, and pale pink lips are closed. The hand farther from us is drawn across the chest and tucked under the arm closer to us, with which the angel holds a tall leafy palm frond. The inside surface of the wing facing us deepens from butter yellow to tangerine orange, and the other side of the wings are lapiz blue. The robe is textured with gold swirls against slate blue for the shadows and rose pink on the sleeves. A gold halo encircles the angel’s head and the gold background is textured with an ornate decorative border along the inner of edges of the top and both sides. The floor beneath the angel is ruby red. The gilding has worn away in some areas, especially in the background, so the red layer beneath is visible through cracks.
Simone Martini, The Angel of the Annunciation, c. 1330, tempera on poplar panel, Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1939.1.216

The Angel of the Annunciation

Simone Martini · c. 1330 · tempera on poplar panel ·  Accession ID  1939.1.216

Four light-skinned men gather around a table in front of a forest-green background in this horizontal painting. In the right half of the picture, two men behind the table are shown from about the waist up. The third man, Cardinal Sauli, sits at the narrow end of the table to our left, and his legs are cropped by the bottom edge of the painting below the knee. The fourth man leans toward the cardinal, and is shown from about the knees up along the left edge of the painting. Cardinal Sauli dominates the composition. His body is angled to our right, and he turns his head to look at us with dark eyes under arched brows. He has a narrow face, a wide nose, and his lips are closed over a round chin. He wears a red cap over brown hair and a red, waist-length cape that buttons down over his chest. His voluminous, long-sleeved, bright white robe has red at the cuffs. Upon closer inspection, what appears to be a black speck on his knee turns out to be a fly painted to look as if it had landed on the surface of the panel. The cardinal’s elbows rest on the arms of a wine-red velvet chair. His right hand, to our left, holds what may be green leather gloves, and he wears a gold ring with a dark oval stone on that ring finger. He rests his other hand palm down on the table, and wears a gold ring with a red stone on the index finger of that hand. Just beyond that hand, a pewter-silver bell edged with wide bands of chased gold sits on the table, which is covered with a cloth patterned with crimson red, harvest yellow, black, and white. At our far left, the man leans toward Cardinal Sauli’s right shoulder, facing our right almost in profile. He has dark, chin-length hair, black eyebrows, a long, straight nose, and a dark, trimmed mustache and beard. His mouth is slightly open. He wears a bright white embroidered, collarless shirt under a black tunic. The fingers of his left hand rest on his chest and he barely touches the back of the velvet chair with his other hand. Behind the table, to our right, the final two men face each other in profile. The man to the left in this pair, closer to Cardinal Sauli, has close-cropped dark hair, a prominent nose, and black eyebrows. His hooded, dark eyes look off to our right, and a mustache frames his closed lips. He rests his right hand on an open book, illustrated with maps, on the table in front of him. The man on the far right holds up his right hand at chest height, and points his right index finger straight up. He has a pointed nose and dark eyes, and his lips are parted under a faint mustache. His brown hair falls to the collar of his ruby-red robe, which falls in vertical pleats from the high neckline. The deep green background seems close to the group, creating a shallow space. The artist signed and dated the painting as if he had written on a piece of paper stuck to the front of the table, but the writing is nearly illegible.
Sebastiano del Piombo, Cardinal Bandinello Sauli, His Secretary, and Two Geographers, 1516, oil on panel, Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1961.9.37

Cardinal Bandinello Sauli, His Secretary, and Two Geographers

Sebastiano del Piombo · 1516 · oil on panel ·  Accession ID  1961.9.37