ALBERTINELLI, Mariotto

This is an early work of the artist. Featuring the Virgin adoring the Child with the help of an angel who hands him some of the instruments of the Passion, it is formally rather weak in its awkward spatial and figural relationships.

The predella of the altarpiece with the Visitation shows three stories from the life of Christ: the Annunciation, the Birth of Christ and the Circumcision. Despite the small size of the three compartments, Albertinelli succeeds in constructing austere, essential spaces which display a great formal balance. The small, full figures are firmly and vigorously placed in scenes which respect the most rigorous perspective laws of the Florentine Quattrocento.

The predella of the altarpiece with the Visitation shows three stories from the life of Christ: the Annunciation, the Birth of Christ and the Circumcision. Despite the small size of the three compartments, Albertinelli succeeds in constructing austere, essential spaces which display a great formal balance. The small, full figures are firmly and vigorously placed in scenes which respect the most rigorous perspective laws of the Florentine Quattrocento.

The predella of the altarpiece with the Visitation shows three stories from the life of Christ: the Annunciation, the Birth of Christ and the Circumcision. Despite the small size of the three compartments, Albertinelli succeeds in constructing austere, essential spaces which display a great formal balance. The small, full figures are firmly and vigorously placed in scenes which respect the most rigorous perspective laws of the Florentine Quattrocento.

The Virgin and Child are represented beside a window with a landscape beyond. The landscape shown through the window at right is painted with a remarkable looseness. The trees, some fine and long limbed, others made full with layered rows of browning leaves, are reminiscent of those in the background of Fra Bartolomeo’s Noli Me Tangere in the Louvre. Albertinelli and Fra Bartolomeo set up a workshop in the 1490s. They appear to have been close friends and the two operated under an equal partnership.

Mariotto Albertinelli, the pupil of Cosimo Rosselli, ran a workshop with Fra Bartolomeo, and like him shared an interest in the painting of Perugino, whose illuminating example is apparent in this work, unanimously considered to be his masterpiece. However, we cannot fail to notice also the monumentality of the figures and the geometrically divided landscape, influences, these, of Fra Bartolomeo. The spatial breadth is still characteristic of Perugino, but the narrative content is more vigorous.

This signed and dated painting is an autograph variant of Albertinelli’ most celebrated work, the Visitation in the Uffizi, Florence, which is dated 1503 but not signed. Just five years after executing the Uffizi prototype, which shows the undeniable influence of Perugino in its use of soft highlights and its inclusion of a classical arcade, the artist returned to the subject using the same cartoon but introduced some fundamental differences to the design: the architectural niche and the landscape have been removed and two additional figures have been introduced. While the central figures may wear robes different in colour and detail from the prototype, they are very much faithful to the original in their harmonious pyramidal design which balances both movement and stasis. Interestingly, the face of Elizabeth in the present work is no longer in shadow as it is in the Uffizi version.

The lateral figures may be the work of Giuliano Bugiardini, who is known to have rented quarters next to Albertinelli in 1503 and began assisting him shortly thereafter.