Duccio di Buoninsegna (c. 1255-1260 - c. 1318-1319) was one of the most influential Italian artists of his time. During this period, some unsigned and undocumented altarpieces appeared, and some of these are certainly Duccio's work; the most significant of these is a small altarpiece representing the Virgin enthroned with angels andcalled “The Madonna of the Franciscans” because of the three monks kneeling at the foot of the throne. 1285 Uffizi Large size Google Art Project : The monks of Vallombrosa ordered an altarpiece with an Enthroned Madonna from Cimabue. Born in Siena, Tuscany, he worked mostly with pigment and egg tempera and like most of his contemporaries he painted religious subject matters. Duccio Duccio, Maesta Duccio, The Rucellai Madonna Duccio, The Virgin and Child with Saints Dominic and Aurea Ambrogio Lorenzetti Palazzo Pubblico frescos: Allegory and Effects of Good and Bad Government Presentation of Jesus in the Temple Pietro Lorenzetti, Birth of the Virgin Simone Martini, Annunciation Pisa, Pistoia and Rome Browse this content In 1982 Hans Belting (“The ‘Byzantine’ Madonnas: New Facts about their Italian Origins and Some Observations on Duccio,” Studies in the History of Art 12 [1982]: 7, 21 n. 2) wrote that the painting had come on the art market in Madrid in 1912, and that it was Weissberger who claimed the painting had come from Calahorra. Madonna Enthroned with the Child, St Francis St. Domenico and two Angels - Tempera on wood, 133 x 81 cm Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence The attribution to Cimabue is debated. Duccio Enthroned Madonna with Child Santa Maria Novellaca.
Some scholars give the painting to an artist influenced by Cimabue and Duccio or to the workshop of Cimabue. In Duccio: Later commissions …enthroned with angels and called The Madonna of the Franciscans because of the three monks kneeling at the foot of the throne.
Here, the Virgin’s cloak is defined by a fluid gold hem. His style is characterised by elegant, flowing lines, soft colours and tender representations of the divine. Mother and child share an affectionate gaze as the infant Christ plays with her white veil. Beneath it and above it are a narrative predella with scenes from the infancy of Christ, and seven scenes from the life of the Virgin. He has influenced Simone Martini and the brothers Ambrogio and Pietro Lorenzetti, among others.
Duccio was the leading artist of fourteenth-century Siena. In this work a developed Gothic style appears in the curving outlines, which give an exquisite decorative effect. In the fifteenth century, this work on the main altar in Santa Trinita was replaced by a painting by Alessio Baldovinetti and was then hung in a side chapel. Duccio di Buoninsegna, Maesta Altarpiece, about 1308-1311, gold and tempera on panel, 370 x 450 cm, ... On the unusually wide main panel are the Virgin and Child enthroned with saints and angels.