The Last Supper

Ugolino di Nerio's Last Supper, painted around 1325–1328 and now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, was originally part of the artist's monumental altarpiece for the high altar of Santa Croce in Florence, one of the most important Franciscan churches in Italy. The dismembered Santa Croce altarpiece was Ugolino's masterwork, rivaling Duccio's Maestà in ambition, and its scattered panels are now distributed across museums worldwide. As a close follower of Duccio, Ugolino brought the refinement of the Sienese school to Florence's greatest Franciscan church.

Executed in tempera and gold on panel, this predella scene arranges the apostles around a long table with Christ at center, following the conventional Gothic Last Supper format derived from Byzantine prototypes. Ugolino's Ducciesque style features refined linear drawing, soft facial modeling, and a warm palette of reds, blues, and golds against the burnished gold ground.