BENEDETTO DA MAIANO, follower of
Maiano 1442-Florence 1497
The Madonna with the Child
painted stucco, diameter 71 cm
A prototype for the stucco in question is a renowned marble made by Florentine sculptor Benedetto da Maiano, between 1491 and 1495, for Filippo Strozzi’s chapel in Santa Maria Novella, where it decorated the rich banker’s acrosolium tomb.
Another version of this iconography, in which the Virgin affectionally holds the Child on her womb, resting her head on that of his blessing child, is the one in marble already part of the Kress collection, previously exhibited at the National Gallery in Washington, but now conserved at the Chazen Museum of Art, in Madison, Wisconsin, with the attribution to the workshop of Benedetto da Maiano (inv. 61.4.12).
Like the American tondo, this polychrome stucco replica too traces with precision the fortunate invention of the maestro, in a lighter material that is easier to reproduce.
Published as a work by Benedetto da Maiano in the catalog of the La natività di Gesù; dipinti e sculture, sec. XIII-XIX exhibition, held in the Museo Diocesano of Gaeta, from December 22nd 2013 until May 1st 2014 (p. 31).
