St. Anne with Saints Peter and Paul

In the central panel, St. Anne, the mother of the Virgin Mary, stands upright in a full-face view resembling that of an icon. The pose creates a sense of senior authority in relation to saints Peter and Paul in the lateral panels, who are depicted in three-quarter views. She holds Mary and the infant Christ, whose halo is uniquely inscribed with a cross.

These panels are the surviving elements of a polyptych painted for the Neapolitan church of Santa Maria Incoronata. In the same church, the anonymous painter also frescoed scenes from the life of Ladislaus, the patron saint of Hungary. These works reflect the ambitions of the city’s reigning king Ladislaus-Durazzo, whose father had usurped the Hungarian crown, only to be swiftly assassinated in 1386.