(Verona circa 1445–1526/9)
Madonna and Child,
oil on panel, 69 x 50.5 cm, framed

Provenance:
Aldo Noseda (1853–1916), Milan;
his sale, Milan, Galleria Pesaro, 2-5 December 1929, lot 165;
Private European collection

Literature:
C. del Bravo, Liberale da Verona, Firenze 1967, p. CCVI, no. 221, pl. XXVI

The present painting depicts the Madonna, half-length, adoring the Child, with a hilly landscape beyond. The child is sleeping, laid down on a pillow in the foreground.

The painting is a characteristic work by the most original painter of late quattrocento in Verona. Liberale’s name derives from his native city of Verona, where he trained as a miniaturist and panel painter. He was influenced initially by Andrea Mantegna and by the Mantegnesque miniaturist Girolamo da Cremona, with whom he worked in the second half of the 1460s, when he moved to Siena. He worked for the monastery of Monte Oliveto Maggiore and for the Opera del Duomo, receiving commissions from the cardinal Francesco Piccolomini. In 1470–74 he illuminated the choir books of Siena Cathedral, now preserved in the Piccolomini Library. Their calligraphic style and imagery exercised a deep influence in Siena, above all on the paintings of Matteo di Giovanni and Francesco di Giorgio. About 1488 Liberale returned to Verona, where he created mediumsized paintings, such as the present work, for private devotion and frescoes in the city’s churches.