St Bonaventure

Girolamo da Treviso the Elder's Saint Bonaventure, painted around 1490 and now in the Rijksmuseum, depicts the Franciscan theologian and cardinal Bonaventure of Bagnoregio, one of the most important medieval Christian thinkers — the Seraphic Doctor whose mystical theology shaped Franciscan spirituality and whose biography of Francis of Assisi became the order's authorized account of its founder. Bonaventure was canonized in 1482, just years before this painting, and the fresh canonization would have given his image particular devotional relevance for Franciscan patrons.

Tempera or oil on panel. Saint Bonaventure is shown in the brown habit of the Franciscan order with his cardinal's regalia — one of the rare Franciscan cardinals — and likely holding a book or quill as the attribute of a Doctor of the Church.