The ''Madonna with Child'', or ''Alzano Madonna'', is an

oil-on-panel A panel painting is a painting made on a flat panel of wood, either a single piece or a number of pieces joined together. Until canvas became the more popular support medium in the 16th century, panel painting was the normal method, when not paint ...

painting by Italian Renaissance artist

Giovanni Bellini Giovanni Bellini (; c. 1430 – 26 November 1516) was an Italian Renaissance painter, probably the best known of the Bellini family of Venetian painters. He was raised in the household of Jacopo Bellini, formerly thought to have been his father ...

, executed around 1485.

History

The work has been in

Bergamo Bergamo (; lmo, Bèrghem ; from the proto- Germanic elements *''berg +*heim'', the "mountain home") is a city in the alpine Lombardy region of northern Italy, approximately northeast of Milan, and about from Switzerland, the alpine lakes Como ...

since as early as the 16th century, where it likely arrived as part of the dowry of Lucrezia Agliardi, who had been abbess in the monastery of Alzano Lombardo, whence the name. After several passages of ownership, in 1891 it was donated to the current museum.

Description

In this picture, Bellini represented the traditional theme of Mary and Child Jesus. Behind them is a hanging tapestry resembling the thrones with baldachin that were common in the contemporary

sacred conversation In art, a (; plural: ''sacre conversazioni''), meaning holy (or sacred) conversation, is a genre developed in Italian Renaissance painting, with a depiction of the Virgin and Child (the Virgin Mary with the infant Jesus) amidst a group of saints ...

s. At the sides are a landscape with towers, castles and small figures, as typical in the artist's production. In the foreground is a red marble parapet where is the usual cartouche with Bellini's signature. There is also a fruit, perhaps a reference to the

original sin Original sin is the Christian doctrine that holds that humans, through the fact of birth, inherit a tainted nature in need of regeneration and a proclivity to sinful conduct. The biblical basis for the belief is generally found in Genesis 3 (t ...

, or an emblem of the Virgin derived from holy books or hymns. This Madonna is generally considered a model of later works, such as the '' Madonna of the Red Cherubims'' or the ''

Madonna of the Small Trees The ''Madonna of the Small Trees'' (Italian: ''Madonna degli Alberetti'') is an oil-on-panel painting by Italian Renaissance artist Giovanni Bellini, executed in 1487. It is housed in the Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice. Stylistic elements, suc ...

'', both in the Galeria dell'Academia, Venice.

References

* {{Giovanni Bellini Paintings of the Madonna and Child by Giovanni Bellini 1480s paintings Collection of the Accademia Carrara