Virgin and Child

The composition may have originated in certain works attributable to Luca della Robbia, but it is directly derived from Andrea's 1479 Adoration altarpiece for the Brizi Chapel of the Chiesea Maggiore at La Verna. The La Verna altar provided the inspiration for numerous workshop variants of varying size, shape and complexity. Unlike most Adoration groups deriving from the La Verna altar, this tondo has the Virgin on the left and the Child on the right. The frame of fruit and flowers is a typical feature of many della Robbia tondi. There is a close iconographical relationship between the Adoration reliefs produced by the della Robbia workshop and the presentation of subjects in other media, and it is probable that depictions in one that influenced those in another. Virtually the same composition appears in Fra Lippi's Madonna Adoring the Child, with St. Bernard and the Infant St. John of about 1463. Similar depictions occurred throughout the later fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries in the work of Baldovinette, Perellino, Neri di Bicci, Lorenzo di Credi, Mainardi, Bartolommeo di Giovanni and Piero di Cosimo. The comparison later influenced that of the paintings of Michele di Ridolfo and Bronzino and Tuscan and Umbrian textile patterns of the Quattrocento.