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Lot Essay
This is a characteristic mature work by Sano di Pietro, the most productive Sienese painter of the mid-quattrocento. It would appear to be from the central panel of an altarpiece, and was probably originally flanked at either side by pairs of panels of full-length saints. Dr. Wolfgang Loseries points out that the textile laid on the throne is identical to that worn by Saint Lawrence in the Montemerano polyptych of 1458: he dates this panel between the mid-1460s and the early 1470s, comparing this with the Buonconvento altarpiece (of not before 1461), the central group in the Badia a Isola altar of 1471 and that at Bolsena in which the face of the Madonna is virtually identical.
J. Pierpont Morgan, at whose posthumous sale the picture is first recorded, was the eponymous son of the celebrated banker, who was one of the outstanding American collectors of the early twentieth century, founding the great Library in New York that bears his name, but also making outstanding acquisitions in numerous fields. The son inherited his father's collection, with the proviso that this should pass to the 'public domain'. A major portion of the works of art were given to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, but the younger Morgan retained a number of his father's pictures, including the four Iredella panels of scenes from the life of Saint John the Baptist by Sano's Sienese contemporary, Giovanni di Paolo: these were acquired by 1909 and were withheld from the 1944 auction (in which these are listed as lot 121) for sale to the National Gallery. It seems very likely that this Madonna was also acquired by the father.
Because the Sienese quattrocento was a field that was rather overlooked until the very end of the nineteenth century, this is very much less well represented in British collections than in their American counterparts. Apart from illuminations in the Fitzwilliam Museum and a Madonna in the Royal Collection, the only works by Sano in British institutions are a pinnacle of the Coronation of the Virgin at Edinburgh, a passion scene in the Courtauld Institute, and three Madonnas with saints at Oxford, one in the Ashmolean and two at Christ Church. The latter are all private devotional works, and thus less monumental in conception than this little-known picture.
J. Pierpont Morgan, at whose posthumous sale the picture is first recorded, was the eponymous son of the celebrated banker, who was one of the outstanding American collectors of the early twentieth century, founding the great Library in New York that bears his name, but also making outstanding acquisitions in numerous fields. The son inherited his father's collection, with the proviso that this should pass to the 'public domain'. A major portion of the works of art were given to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, but the younger Morgan retained a number of his father's pictures, including the four Iredella panels of scenes from the life of Saint John the Baptist by Sano's Sienese contemporary, Giovanni di Paolo: these were acquired by 1909 and were withheld from the 1944 auction (in which these are listed as lot 121) for sale to the National Gallery. It seems very likely that this Madonna was also acquired by the father.
Because the Sienese quattrocento was a field that was rather overlooked until the very end of the nineteenth century, this is very much less well represented in British collections than in their American counterparts. Apart from illuminations in the Fitzwilliam Museum and a Madonna in the Royal Collection, the only works by Sano in British institutions are a pinnacle of the Coronation of the Virgin at Edinburgh, a passion scene in the Courtauld Institute, and three Madonnas with saints at Oxford, one in the Ashmolean and two at Christ Church. The latter are all private devotional works, and thus less monumental in conception than this little-known picture.