Madonna and Child

The Virgin Mary cradles the baby Jesus, pressing her head against his. Save for a column on the left, all background detail has been omitted. Mary’s powder blue drapery fills the majority of the canvas. Just as she draws her son close to her, the artist compresses the pictorial space and places the viewer in close proximity to the figures.

Once attributed to Correggio due to its tender style, this painting is rather almost certainly the work of another Parmese artist called Bertoja. A prolific fresco painter, the Farnese family engaged Bertoja to decorate their palace in Parma and their villa at Caprarola near Rome. His work is characterized by its translucent colors and figures with anatomical distortions.