Count Ugo Beni

Italian

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Shown from the knees up behind a gray ledge, a woman with pale, peachy skin stands holding a palm frond in one hand and a disembodied pair of eyes branching from a stem like a flower in the other in this vertical, arched painting. Against a gold background, the woman’s body faces us, but her head turns to our left even as she cuts her hooded, light gray eyes down to the pair of disembodied eyes she holds to our right. On her oval face, one of her curving brows is lifted, and she has a rounded chin, flushed cheeks, and her pink lips are closed. Her blond hair is pulled up under a sheer white head covering, and the ends of opaque white fabric, like a scarf, flutter up over each her shoulders. She wears a ruby-red dress with ties up the sleeves, which are worn over a white undergarment. Over the dress, her forest-green robe is tied under her bust, and the edges are bordered with gold along the slitted openings for the sleeves and down the front. Green drapery falls behind the gray ledge, but is bunched up to our right, suggesting that one foot rests up on the ledge so the knee is at hip height. In her right hand, to our left, she holds a dark green palm frond with long, blade-like leaves. Held delicately in her other hand, the disembodied pair of eyes are attached with leaf-like sepals where the petals of a flower usually connect with the stem. The eyes are light brown and seem to look up between peach-colored upper and lower lids. A gold halo with radiating lines is incised into the gold background around the woman’s head. The top half of the panel is arched.
Francesco del Cossa, Saint Lucy, c. 1473/1474, tempera on poplar panel, Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1939.1.228

Saint Lucy

Francesco del Cossa · c. 1473/1474 · tempera on poplar panel ·  Accession ID  1939.1.228

Francesco del Cossa, Saint Florian, c. 1473/1474, tempera on poplar panel, Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1939.1.227

Saint Florian

Francesco del Cossa · c. 1473/1474 · tempera on poplar panel ·  Accession ID  1939.1.227