Bugiardini almost certainly painted this altarpiece for Bindo Altoviti, a Florentine banker who was one of the greatest patrons of his day. Altoviti commissioned it for his private chapel dedicated to the Magdalen in the town of Cappiano. Remarkably, the painting has survived in its original frame—the Altoviti arms are on the base of the pilasters—probably designed by the talented architect and woodworker Baccio d’Agnolo and painted by a specialist in ornament. Altarpieces were the work of multiple specialists, each playing an important role in linking the picture to its architectural setting and enhancing its functions as a devotional tool and a statement of a patron’s virtuous generosity.
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Fig. 1. Painting in frame: overall
Fig. 2. Painting in frame: corner
Fig. 3. Painting in frame: angled corner
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Fig. 4. Profile drawing of frame (T. Newbery)
Artwork Details
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Title:Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints Mary Magdalen and John the Baptist
Artist:Giuliano di Piero di Simone Bugiardini (Italian, Florence 1475–1554 Florence)
Date:ca. 1523
Medium:Oil on wood
Dimensions:76 1/4 x 65 1/4 in. (193.7 x 165.7 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:Fletcher Fund, 1930
Object Number:30.83
Inscription: Inscribed (on scroll): ECCE·A[G]N[U]S·DEI
the church of Santa Maria Maddalena all'Isola, Incisa Valdarno, Tuscany; the Altoviti family, Florence; Colonel Sacchetti, Villa Isola, near Incisa Valdarno (until about 1910); the Sacchetti heirs, Incisa Valdarno, Prato, and Milan (1910–30); [comte Umberto Gnoli, Rome, 1930; sold to The Met]
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Florentine Paintings in the Metropolitan Museum," June 15–August 15, 1971, no catalogue.
Luigi Passerini. Genealogia e storia della famiglia Altoviti. Florence, 1871, p. 15, mentions an altarpiece by Andrea del Sarto in the church of S. Maria Maddalena in Padule, probably this painting.
Walther Biehl. "Die 'Madonna Sacchetti': Ein unbekanntes Bild aus Fra Bartolommeos Werkstatt in S. Marco." Monatshefte für Kunstwissenschaft 9 (1916), pp. 237–41, pl. 58, considers that this painting is from the workshop of Fra Bartolomeo; dates it about 1509–12, tentatively suggesting that Mariotto Albertinelli collaborated on the figures and Fra Paolino on the background, and identifies the arms in the frame with those of the Altoviti family.
Hans Tietze. Meisterwerke europäischer Malerei in Amerika. Vienna, 1935, p. 327, pl. 58 [English ed., "Masterpieces of European Painting in America," New York, 1939, p. 311, pl. 58], attributes it to Fra Bartolomeo, suggesting the collaboration of Albertinelli.
F. Mason Perkins. Letter. March 24, 1938, attributes it to a Florentine painter strongly influenced by Fra Bartolomeo.
Harry B. Wehle. The Metropolitan Museum of Art: A Catalogue of Italian, Spanish, and Byzantine Paintings. New York, 1940, p. 62, ill., attributes it to Bugiardini.
Ruth Wedgwood Kennedy. "Review of Wehle 1940." Art Bulletin 24 (June 1942), p. 195, concurs with the change in attribution from Fra Bartolomeo to Bugiardini.
Rufus G. Mather. Letter. 1947 [see Zeri and Gardner 1971], identifies the coat of arms as that of the Del Nero family of Florence.
Josephine L. Allen and Elizabeth E. Gardner. A Concise Catalogue of the European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1954, p. 14.
Bernard Berenson. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance: Florentine School. London, 1963, vol. 1, p. 45, attributes it to Bugiardini.
Fiorella Sricchia Santoro. "Per il Franciabigio." Paragone 14 (July 1963), p. 22 n. 26, attributes it to Bugiardini and notes Franciabigio's influence, dating it after 1512.
Federico Zeri with the assistance of Elizabeth E. Gardner. Italian Paintings: A Catalogue of the Collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Florentine School. New York, 1971, pp. 190–91, ill., attribute it to Bugiardini, noting the influence of Fra Bartolomeo and Raphael; suggest a date of about 1510–15 due to similarities to Bugiardini's "Marriage of Saint Catherine" (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna); note that the frame is apparently original and bears the arms of the Altoviti family of Florence.
S. J. Freedberg. Painting in Italy: 1500 to 1600. Harmondsworth, England, 1971, p. 158, attributes it to Bugiardini and dates it about 1540, calling it the most impressive effort of his latest years.
Burton B. Fredericksen and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth-Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass., 1972, pp. 37, 336, 415, 431, 607.
S[ilvia]. Meloni Trkulja inDizionario biografico degli italiani. Vol. 15, Rome, 1972, p. 16, attributes it to Bugiardini and dates it to the second decade of the sixteenth century, noting the influence of Franciabigio.
Laura Pagnotta. Giuliano Bugiardini. Turin, 1987, pp. 51, 60, 207, no. 37, figs. 37, 37a (overall and detail), dates it about 1518.
Antonio Altoviti. Fin de race a Cinecittà. Florence, 1994, p. 101, notes the arms of the Altoviti family on the frame.
Gigetta Dalli Regoli. "Una nota per Giuliano Bugiardini." Commentari d'arte 1 (September–December 1995), p. 48.
Katharine Baetjer. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born Before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. New York, 1995, p. 33, ill., as "Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints Mary Magdalen and John the Baptist".
Eliot W. Rowlands. The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: Italian Paintings, 1300–1800. Kansas City, Mo., 1996, p. 147, dates it 1518–20 and calls it one of Bugiardini's most successful works.
The Dictionary of Art. Ed. Jane Turner. Vol. 5, New York, 1996, p. 129, calls it "his most impressive surviving late work" and dates it about 1540.
Donatella Pegazzano inRaphael, Cellini & a Renaissance Banker: The Patronage of Bindo Altoviti. Ed. Alan Chong et al. Exh. cat., Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Boston, 2003, pp. 67–68, 85 n. 51, fig. 26 (color), suggests identifying it with a painting attributed by Luigi Passerini (see Ref. 1871) to Andrea del Sarto commissioned by Bindo for a chapel dedicated to the Magdalen founded by him in 1523 at Cappiano, noting that the painting could have been moved from Cappiano to Villa a Isola nearby; records a verbal communication from Alessandro Cecchi suggesting that the frame may have been made by Baccio d'Agnolo and the grotesque by Andrea di Cosimo Feltrini.
Michele Maccherini inRaphael, Cellini & A Renaissance Banker: The Patronage of Bindo Altoviti. Ed. Alan Chong et al. Exh. cat., Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. Boston, 2003, pp. 391–92, no. 12, ill. (color, framed), dates it about 1523, based on stylistic considerations and on the tentative identification with the painting recorded by Passerini at Cappiano (see Pegazzano 2003); discusses the frame, noting that the lower part, with the Altoviti arms, must have been executed by a different artist.
Antonio Natali inLeonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, and the Renaissance in Florence. Ed. David Franklin. Exh. cat., National Gallery of Canada. Ottawa, 2005, p. 122.
Andrea Bayer. "Giuliano Bugiardini: A Master of Theme and Variation." A Golden Age of European Art: Celebrating Fifty Years of the Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation. Ed. James Clifton and Melina Kervandjian. Houston, 2016, pp. 69–73, 79 n. 8, figs. 1 (color), 5–7 (infrared photograph details), discusses the early provenance, stating that the painting was almost certainly commissioned by Bindo Altoviti; discusses the underdrawing visible in infrared photographs.
Andreas Schumacher inFlorentiner Malerei, Alte Pinakothek: Die Gemälde des 14. bis 16. Jahrhunderts. Ed. Andreas Schumacher, Annette Kranz, and Annette Hojer. Berlin, 2017, p. 543, under no. 38.
The frame is Florentine and dates to about 1510–15 (see figs. 1–4 above). This fine painted giltwood tabernacle altarpiece is constructed of poplar. It is comprised of a predella base and pilaster sides with Corinthian capitals which support an aedicular cornice with dentil and egg and dart carved ornament. It includes a later slip liner at the sight edge which was added when the panel painting was reduced on the right side and at the base to remove insect damage. The frieze panels have applied giltwood ogee moldings with a fillet top edge. The frame is decorated along the base with faux marbre pietre dure in ochre and purplish-brown and includes the Altoviti family’s coat of arms. The same color serves as a ground for the candelabra oil-gilded decoration on the pilaster friezes and beneath the scrolling anthemion decoration across the cornice face and sides. Faux marbre colors the outsides of the pilasters. The predella ledge has mortises, now filled, where a monstrance or small painting would have previously been secured. Minor ingilding and repairs have taken place but the surface and carving are largely intact. This magnificent frame, probably designed by d’Agnolo and decorated by Andrea di Cosimo Feltrini, is original to the painting. A related frame also with fine oil-gilded decoration is on Cosimo di Roselli’s Incoronazione della Virgine (1505) in the monastery of Santa Maria Maddalena dei Pazzi, Florence.
Timothy Newbery with Cynthia Moyer 2020; further information on this frame can be found in the Department of European Paintings files
Antonello da Messina (Antonello di Giovanni d'Antonio) (Italian, Messina ca. 1430–1479 Messina)
ca. 1470
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