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ANTONIO DI ARCANGELO, AKA ANTONIO DEL CERAIOLO

Antonio di Arcangelo, aka Antonio del Ceraiolo (Known in Florence between 1518 and 1538)
Madonna and Child

Light wood tondo, tapered, backed with a reinforced oak plank.

Width: 63 cm
Original thickness reduced to 0.4 cm
Actual thickness: 1 cm

The Virgin is seated in a balcony overlooking a distant landscape of mountains and lakes, holding the Child in her right arm, while her left hand holds an open book.
She is wearing a collarless, vermillion red dress, tied at the waist with a dark cord. A large blue-green cloak covers her head and falls to her knees. The Child is nude, and holds a bird in his hands symbolizing the Passion. Their heads are topped with halos.
Mary sits in the corner of an architecture of columns, opening onto a distant landscape bathed in light. The two faces are also brightly lit and have a look of foreboding symbolizing the Child's future sacrifice.

This work, the first of its kind, is part of a long line of devotion paintings with similar subjects created by Antonio di Agostino in Florence in the early 16th century. The composition of his models, some including John the Baptist or others, are inspired by the art of Lorenzo di Credi (ca. 1459-1537), one of Antonio's teachers, while the misty chiaroscuro of the landscapes is inspired by the work of Ridolfo del Ghirlandajo, one of Antonio's colleagues. Many examples from this studio attest this pedigree (including, among others, Lorenzo di Credi's 'Virgin breastfeeding')
Pinacoteca Vaticana; Madonna and Child, Détroit inv. 53.447, repr. In Fondazione Zeri n° 13019 and 13004)
We know very little about Antonio di Agostino aka Ceraiolo's life. His nickname refers to his father's profession as a candlemaker.
Vasari left us several notes about his activity in the lives of Domenico Puligo and Ridolfo del Ghirlandajo, including that the artist was a gifted portrait-painter, trained in the studio of Lorenzo di Credi, and mentions two of his original panels: The Archangel Saint Michael the weigher of souls (Florence, Galleria dell'
Accademia) and a Crucifixion that l'Aretin saw at the San Jacopo tra i Fossi church (Florence, Cenacolo de San Salvi); to this must also be added Christ at Martha and Mary's house, documented and dated 1524 (Berlin, Staatliche Museen).
Surrounding these works, F. Zeri (1), the first, has identified a certain number of paintings adjacent to Antonio's life, and dated similar ones, dedicated to devotion with similar subjects and compositions to this painting, around 1520-1525. This study was revisited, detailed and expanded by A. Tamburino (2), who puts the date of these paintings earlier, ca. 1515-1520. The similarity to works conserved in Berlin (fig.141) or Cincinnati (fig.142) exemplifies the relationship well, and allows this painting to be dated to the same period.
1. F. Zeri, « Antonio del Ceraiolo », Gazette des beaux-arts, 70, 1967, p. 139-154
2. A. Tamburino, « Considerazioni sull'attività del Ceraiolo e proposte al suo catalogo » Proporzioni, NS.
2/3, 2001-2002, p.104-122

Expert: Cabinet Turquin
Antique restorations and minor chips in the edge. D : 63 cm

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