This masterpiece of Sienese painting combines Giovanni di Paolo’s exquisite visionary effects and narrative detail. The picture presents a vision of Paradise reminiscent of that described by the great Florentine poet Dante in "The Divine Comedy." The universe is shown as a celestial globe, with the earth at the center surrounded by a series of concentric circles representing first the four elements, the known planets (including the sun, in accordance with medieval and Renaissance cosmology), and finally the constellations of the zodiac. Presiding over the scene of Creation is God the Father, bathed in a glowing celestial light as he is borne aloft by seraphim. Beside the "mappamondo" (map of the world) is the garden of Paradise, its four rivers issuing from the ground at the lower right. The garden's effulgent flora symbolize the pure and sinless state of man before the Fall. A diminutive Adam and Eve are expelled from the garden by a lithe angel whose unusual nakedness and human form may symbolize his deep compassion for the corrupted state of humankind after the fall from grace. This panel was originally part of the predella (the lowermost horizontal component) of Giovanni di Paolo's "Guelfi Altarpiece," formerly in the Church of San Domenico in Siena (now Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence). It originally joined a representation of Paradise, now in the Metropolitan Museum (06.1046). For a reconstruction of the altarpiece, see http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-collection-online/search/436512?rpp=30&pg=1&ft=giovanni+di+paolo&pos=1 (additional images). .
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Albin Chalandon, Paris; Georges Chalandon, Paris; Camille Benoît, Paris (see M. Logan, "L'exposition de l'ancien art siennois," Gazette des Beaux-Arts, ser. 3, vol. 32, 1904, pp. 210-11; Crowe and Cavalcaselle, New History, vol. 3 1914, p. 178); F. Kleinberger, Paris; acquired by Philip Lehman in January 1917
Isidoro Ugurgieri Azzolini. Le pompe sanesi, o vero relazione delli huomini e donne illustri di Siena, e suo stato. Vol. 2, Sanesi pittori, scultori, architetti, ed altri artefici famosi. Pistoia, 1649, p. 346.
Guglielmo Della Valle. Lettere sansei di un socio dell'Accademia di Fossano sopra le belle arti. Vol. 3, Venice, 1789, p. 50.
Corrado Ricci. Il Palazzo Pubblico di Siena e la mostra d'antica arte senese. Bergamo, 1904, no. 10.
F. Mason-Perkins. "La pittura alla mostra d'arte antica in Siena." Rassegna d'arte 4 (October 1904), pp. 149-150.
F. Mason Perkins. "The Sienese Exhibition of Ancient Art." Burlington Magazine 5 (September 1904), p. 583.
André Pératé. "Les expositions d'art siennois à Sienne & à Londres." Les arts no. 33 (September 1904), p. 16.
Mary Logan. "L'exposition de l'ancien art siennois." Gazette des beaux-arts, 3rd ser., 32 (1904), pp. 210-211.
Emil Jacobsen. Das Quattrocento in Siena: Studien in der Gemäldegalerie der Akademie. Strasbourg, 1908, pp. 44, 48, pl. 26.1.
Bernhard Berenson. The Central Italian Painters of the Renaissance. 2nd ed., rev. and enl. New York, 1909, p. 178.
Edward Hutton, ed. A New History of Painting in Italy from the II to the XVI Century.. By [Joseph Archer] Crowe and [Giovanni Battista] Cavalcaselle. Vol. 3, The Florentine, Umbrian, and Sienese Schools of the XV Century. London, 1909, p. 127 n. 2.
Tancred Borenius, ed. A History of Painting in Italy: Umbria, Florence, and Siena from the Second to the Sixteenth Century.. By J[oseph]. A[rcher]. Crowe and G[iovanni]. B[attista]. Cavalcaselle. Vol. 5, Umbrian and Sienese Masters of the Fifteenth Century. London, 1914, p. 178.
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Cesare Brandi. Giovanni di Paolo. Florence, 1947, pp. 76-77.
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Richard Offner. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. Vol. 6, section 3, The Fourteenth Century. New York, 1956, Pl. 62a
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Charles Sterling. "Exposition de l'Orangerie: La collection Lehman." La Revue des Arts 3 (1957), p. 134, fig. 1.
Lázló Baránsky-Jób. "The Problems and Meaning of Giovanni di Paolo's Expulsion from Paradise." Marsyas 8 (1957–1959), pp. 1-6. Fig. 1.
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John Pope-Hennessy. "Sassetta and Giovanni di Paolo." Art News Annual 27 (1959), pp. 152-153.
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Krenz. Medieval Symbolism of Monastic Gardens as a Particular Example of Man’s Longing for the Perfection of Eden. Krakow, 2006.
Salomon Grimberg. Frida Kahlo: The Still Lifes. London, 2008, pp. 100, 102, fig. on p. 100.
Nadeije Laneyrie-Dagen. L'invention de la nature: les quatre éléments à la Renaissance ou le peintre premier savant. Paris, 2008, pp. 24-25, fig. 16.
Giovanni di Paolo (Giovanni di Paolo di Grazia) (Italian, Siena 1398–1482 Siena)
ca. 1450
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