The Madonna and Child with Saints Stephen and John the Baptist

Giampietrino is one of the most interesting of all the Lombard followers of Leonardo da Vinci. He may have trained in Leonardo's workshop as early as the mid-1490s, and his mature style shows the clear influence of Leonardo's second Milanese period (mid-1508-13), for example a group of devotional paintings of the Madonna and Child, including Madonna of the Cherries (Milan, Rob Smeets Collection) and Madonna and Child (Rome, Galleria Borghese) of circa 1510 (see P.C. Marani, 'Giovan Pietro Rizzoli, called Giampietrino' in G. Bora, et al., The Legacy of Leonardo: Painters in Lombardy 1490-1530, Milan, 1998, pp. 275-300). The present work shares an affinity with these as well as Leonardo's drawings, one of which, Madonna and Child with a cat (British Museum, no. 1860-6-16-100), depicts the Virgin's head in a very similar position.