The Master of Pratovecchio (active between about 1435 and 1455) was an Italian painter of

the Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...

, named by

Roberto Longhi Roberto Longhi (28 December 1890 – 3 June 1970) was an Italian academic, art historian, and curator. The main subjects of his studies were the painters Caravaggio and Piero della Francesca. Early life and career Longhi was born in December 189 ...

in a 1952 article on the basis of stylistic similarities of a number of works to an altarpiece painted for the monastery of San Giovanni Evangelista in

Pratovecchio Pratovecchio Stia is a ''comune'' in the province of Arezzo, Tuscany. It was formed by the merger of the two former ''comuni'' of Pratovecchio and Stia in 2014. History Dono di Paolo, father of the Florentine artist Paolo Uccello, was a Barber, bar ...

. The centre panel of the triptych, depicting the

Assumption of the Virgin The Assumption of Mary is one of the four Catholic_Mariology#Dogmatic_teachings, Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Pope Pius XII defined it in 1950 in his apostolic constitution ''Munificentissimus Deus'' as follows: We proclaim and d ...

is currently on deposit in Arrezo; the left and right side-panels are in the

National Gallery, London The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current Director o ...

. Other works attributed to the artist include ''Three Archangels'' in the

Gemäldegalerie, Berlin The Gemäldegalerie (, ''Painting Gallery'') is an art museum in Berlin, Germany, and the museum where the main selection of paintings belonging to the Berlin State Museums (''Staatliche Museen zu Berlin'') is displayed. It was first opened in ...

, a ''Madonna and Child'' in the Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts, another ''Madonna and Child'' in the Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan and a ''Madonna with six angels'', in the Pierpont Morgan Library & Museum, New York. The Master's works are considered to be strongly influenced by the painters

Domenico Veneziano Domenico Veneziano (c. 1410 – May 15, 1461) was an Italian painter of the early Renaissance, active mostly in Perugia and Tuscany. Little is known of his birth, though he is thought to have been born in Venice, hence his last name. He then moved ...

and

Andrea del Castagno Andrea del Castagno () or Andrea di Bartolo di Bargilla (; – 19 August 1457) was an Italian painter from Florence, influenced chiefly by Masaccio and Giotto di Bondone. His works include frescoes in Sant'Apollonia in Florence and the painte ...

, but also the sculptor

Donatello Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi ( – 13 December 1466), better known as Donatello ( ), was a Republic of Florence, Florentine sculptor of the Renaissance period. Born in Republic of Florence, Florence, he studied classical sculpture and use ...

. In 1974 a painting then in the Getty collection attributed to the Master of Pratovecchio (subsequently sold in 2011),The Master of Pratovecchio, Madonna and Child enthroned with Angels and flanked by Saint Bridget and the Archangel Michael
Sotheby's, 27 January 2011 depicting a Madonna and Child with Saint Bridget and the Archangel Michael, was linked by Burton B. Fredricksen to a painting similarly to have included the Archangel Michael and Saint Bridget, commissioned in 1439 for the Bridgetine convent at Pian di Ripoli, for which payment was made to a Giovanni di Francesco del Cervelliera da Rovezzano. However, due to marked differences in style between the works attributed to the Master of Pratovecchio and those attributed for Giovanni di Francesco later in the 1450s, it has been suggested that despite the payment, the work was not created by Giovanni di Francesco, but only later, by another. Another name, suggested by Padoa Rizzo in 1993, is Jacopo di Antonio (1427-1454), a cousin of Giovanni di Francesco. However, the only work previously associated with him is of a different style again, attributed by some instead to

Pesellino Francesco Pesellino (probably 1422–July 29, 1457), also known as Francesco di Stefano, was an Italian Renaissance painter active in Florence. His father was the painter Stefano di Francesco (died 1427), and his maternal grandfather was the pai ...

or a close follower. Writing in 2005 Andrea De Marchi therefore considered the identifications so far presented to be "not at all satisfactory".Keith Christiansen (2005), ed.
From Filippo Lippi to Piero Della Francesca: Fra Carnevale and the Making of a Renaissance Master
'. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art. . p. 80; see also pp
286–7

References

Further reading