Saint Peter Martyr Healing the Leg of a Young Man

Antonio Vivarini

ca. 1450 · Tempera and gold on wood · European Paintings

This painting belongs to a series of eight scenes that would have been arranged around an image or statue of Saint Peter Martyr (1205–1252). Here the saint ministers to a youth who had kicked his mother and cut off his leg in remorse. A genial storyteller, Antonio sets the scene in a carpenter’s shop. Together with his younger brother Bartolomeo, his partner Giovanni d’Allemagna (who died in 1450), and his son Alvise, Antonio established a family enterprise in Venice surpassed in prestige only by that of Jacopo Bellini and his sons.

Artist

Antonio Vivarini

Date

ca. 1450

Medium

Tempera and gold on wood

Department

European Paintings

Credit line

Gift of Samuel H. Kress Foundation, 1937