Madonna Uffizi

This Madonna at the Uffizi demonstrates Antonello da Messina's devotional imagery at its most refined, combining the emotional warmth of Netherlandish Madonna types with the monumental clarity of Italian Renaissance form. The Uffizi's comprehensive collection of Italian painting places this Antonello in direct relationship with the Florentine masters who were his Italian contemporaries — Botticelli, Ghirlandaio, Verrocchio — allowing comparison of his southern Italian and Flemish-influenced approach with the specifically Florentine idiom dominant in the collection. The Madonna's internal spirituality, conveyed through downcast eyes and contained presence, owes as much to Flemish devotional painting's interiorizing tradition as to Italian formal conventions.

The Madonna's face is modeled with Antonello's luminous oil technique, the warm flesh tones built up through transparent glazes that create an effect of inner light characteristic of his mature devotional works.