Madonna and Child

Giovanni Bellini

late 1480s · Oil on wood · European Paintings

Separated from our everyday world by a parapet, the Madonna nonetheless draws the viewer in with her gaze. A cloth of honor, a rich textile often displayed behind her, has been pulled aside to reveal a distant landscape, where we witness the transition from dormant to verdant nature—a metaphor, like the dawn sky, for death and rebirth. The asymmetrical composition looks ahead to the work of Titian. When Albrecht Dürer visited Venice, he met Bellini, then in his seventies, and declared him "still the best in the art of painting." The fine Venetian frame is of the period.

Artist

Giovanni Bellini

Date

late 1480s

Medium

Oil on wood

Department

European Paintings

Credit line

Rogers Fund, 1908