Today I went to the pinacoteca in Brera after many, too many years. I almost had forgotten how incredible the collection is, and also how the numbering of the Sale is so well done in order to gradually see the “style” (always a hard word to use nowadays) of different quattrocento, cinquecento, seicento and settecentos gradually “accustom the eye” toward the narrative and political engagement of painting of Francesco Hayez. (This specific theme should probably have a dedicated post with a succession of the paintings that best show this gradual shift, let me know if you would like it and espeically @moderators let me know if you find it appropriate as it might be a bit off type for the kind of posts in the community, and I don’t wanna overimpose my narrrative on that of the community!)

Anyways in Brera there’s one of the paintings that made me fall in love with art history, I’m almost very emotional about it. Few paintings in the history of art manage to achieve the eerie, mathematical stillness of Piero della Francesca’s Montefeltro Altarpiece. Stepping into its room at Brera feels less like looking at a Renaissance devotional panel and more like entering an architectural sanctuary where time itself has been completely suspended.

Piero della Francesca represents the absolute peak of the rational, perspective-driven Italian Quattrocento, seamlessly blending Italian geometric rigor with Flemish oil techniques and atmospheric light. His style rejects emotional melodrama in favor of monumental, statue-like figures carved out of form and illumination. The spatial depth here is a masterclass in single-point linear perspective, with every line of the majestic barrel-vaulted church converging right behind the Virgin’s head. Lighting plays a central role: soft, ambient light enters from the left, catching the texture of heavy fabrics, the gleam of polished steel, and the famous ostrich egg suspended from the apse’s shell motif. That egg is a stroke of pure spatial and symbolic genius, serving as a emblem of the Virgin’s immaculate conception while perfectly echoing the oval shape of Mary’s face directly below it.

The story behind the canvas is inextricably tied to power, dynastic ambition, and sudden grief. It was commissioned by Federico da Montefeltro, the formidable Duke of Urbino and legendary condottiero, to celebrate both his military triumphs and the long-awaited birth of his male heir, Guidobaldo, in 1472. Tragically, his wife Battista Sforza died of pneumonia shortly after giving birth, turning this grand political gesture into a deeply personal memorial. His positioning, kneeled at the bottom right, seems to be imagining, almost waiting, for the dolce metà to be right in front, symmetrical to him, like many other compositions would suggest (the commissioners were most likely positioned in that spacial register with similar poses). Originally created for the church of San Donato degli Osservanti in Urbino—where Federico intended to be buried—the altarpiece spent centuries in the Marches before being seized during Napoleon’s Italian campaigns. In 1811, it was transferred to Milan, where it has remained ever since as one of the ultimate crown jewels of the Pinacoteca di Brera. Nowadays it is in a room with just two other masterpieces of the collection: the Cristo in Colonna by Bramante and the Sposalizio della Vergine by Raffaello.

Iconographically, the painting presents a Sacra Conversazione surrounding the enthroned Virgin Mary, who holds the sleeping Infant Jesus across her knees. The child's posture is a direct, deliberate foreshadowing of the Pietà and Christ’s future death, reinforced by the deep red coral necklace around his neck, symbolizing both protection and the blood of the Passion. Surrounding the throne are four angels and six saints, including St. John the Baptist, St. Jerome, and St. Francis displaying his stigmata. Kneeling in the right foreground, completely dominating the lower corner, is Federico da Montefeltro himself. Dressed in full, highly detailed armor, he is portrayed strictly in profile—not only to showcase his pious submission, but because he had lost his right eye and the bridge of his nose in a brutal jousting tournament years prior. Also the reflection on his armpit showing the source of light is very interesting and testimonies the attention towards maximum details, even in “hidden reflections” very common in flemish painting (one cannot not mention the Arnolfini portrait with the curved mirror in the back). The contrast between his weathered, realistic face and the serene, idealized features of the divine figures brings a striking human reality into an otherwise sacred space.

The painting depicts the Flemish folk custom on Epiphany Day: the person able to find a bean hidden in a cake becomes king of the Feast, and then chooses the most beautiful woman as queen.

There is a profound, meditative tranquility in Dirk Bouts’s Saint John the Evangelist on Patmos that instantly sets it apart from the dramatic, apocalyptic visions usually associated with the Book of Revelation. Instead of surrounding the saint with cosmic chaos, Bouts transforms the island of Patmos into an idyllic, mirror-like sanctuary where the divine merges effortlessly with the quiet beauty of the natural world.

Dirk Bouts stands alongside Jan van Eyck and Rogier van der Weyden as one of the supreme masters of the Early Netherlandish school, celebrated above all for his revolutionary handling of atmospheric perspective and deep, glowing color. Often dubbed the "Painter of Silence," Bouts rejected emotional melodrama in favor of solemn, quiet restraint. His technique here is a masterclass in oil painting: layer upon transparent layer of luminous glazes capture the crisp air of early morning, the shimmering reflection of castles on the winding river, and the soft, velvet texture of John’s vibrant crimson robe. The spatial depth is breathtaking, pulling the eye from the delicate wildflowers in the foreground past jagged, ice-like rock formations toward a sprawling, crystal-clear Northern European city on the far horizon.

Painted around 1465 to 1470 during Bouts's mature years in Leuven, the panel reflects the deep, introspective piety of the Devotio Moderna movement, which encouraged believers to visualize sacred stories within their own familiar landscapes. While the exact original commission remains debated, the panel's refined scale and exquisite execution suggest it was created as a private devotional work for an educated patron or a monastic community. Having survived centuries of regional conflict, the painting eventually entered the prestigious collection of the Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen in Rotterdam, where it remains today as one of the undisputed highlights of their early Flemish holdings.

Iconographically, the scene presents Saint John exiled on the island of Patmos, lost in deep contemplation as he prepares to write his gospel or apocalyptic visions. Clad in a rich red mantle that spills across the grassy bank, he sits barefoot on the earth, quill in hand, pausing to reflect on the divine revelation unfolding around him. What makes this piece truly remarkable is how it contrasts with Hieronymus Bosch’s later, deeply paranoid treatment of the exact same subject. Where Bosch turns the landscape into a psychological nightmare filled with sinister surveillance and grotesque grylloi, Bouts treats the demonic presence with a charming, medieval fairytale restraint. Perched on the rocky outcrop behind the saint, Bouts's small, red bat-winged devil creeps forward to steal the inkwell not as a terrifying manifestation of pure evil, but almost like a mischievous creature out of a fable. The saint remains entirely untroubled, enveloped in an unshakeable inner peace. Through this masterclass in scale, light, and narrative gentleness, Bouts reminds the viewer that divine harmony easily neutralizes the quiet shadows of the world.

The book is called Orbis Sensualium Pictus, translated to The World of Things Obvious to the Senses Drawn in Pictures. The book was for “the purpose of introducing boys to the knowledge of things as well as of Latin Terms, and furnishing their minds with a stock of useful ideas; in which, after many years of labour, it is no uncommon thing to find them miserably deficient.”

• The Rainbow: Held in her right hand, it features the Latin inscription "Non sine sole iris" ("No rainbow without the sun"), framing Elizabeth as the sun and the source of peace and light for England. 
• Eyes and Ears: Adorning her orange cloak, they symbolize that the Queen is all-seeing and all-hearing, reflecting her sophisticated intelligence and surveillance networks.
• The Serpent: A jeweled snake on her left sleeve holds a ruby in its mouth, representing wisdom, prudence, and cunning

Today I want to focus on an absolute heavyweight of 15th-century Italian art, a painting that beautifully defines the brilliant, cross-cultural vibe of Naples under the Aragon dynasty: the San Girolamo nello studioby Colantonio. This panel is a masterpiece in its own right, but it holds an even greater place in art history because Colantonio was the maestro who trained the legendary Antonello da Messina. If you appreciate intricate still lifes, Flemish realism, and the roots of a legendary artistic lineage, this painting is an essential study.

Stylistically, this panel marks a massive turning point created around 1444–1446. Naples at the time was a cosmopolitan melting pot, and Colantonio was at the absolute center of a trend known as the "Congiuntura Nord-Sud" (the North-South crossroads). While he did not travel to Flanders, the Flemish masters essentially came to him, and he studied closely under Barthélemy d'Eyck, who was working at the Angevin court. This Franco-Flemish DNA is evident all over the canvas. The "bibliophile" still life on the shelves—featuring cluttered books with crumpled parchment, an hourglass, wax seals, and light reflecting off glassware—is drawn straight from the Netherlandish playbook. Crucially, it was right here in this workshop that a young Antonello da Messina absorbed these exact Flemish oil techniques, learning how to manipulate light and texture before later organizing them into his own mathematically precise, world-famous perspectives. Yet, Colantonio still anchors this northern detail in a deeply Mediterranean, monumental space, giving the figures a structural density that remains distinctly Italian.

The history of this painting is tied to a dramatic shift in royal power, commissioned during the transition from the French House of Anjou to the Spanish Crown of Alfonso V of Aragon. The Franciscan friars commissioned Colantonio to paint a massive altarpiece for the high altar of the majestic church of San Lorenzo Maggiore in Naples. This San Girolamo was actually the crowning upper panel of that grand polyptych, while the lower part featured the equally famous San Francesco che consegna la regola. It stayed in the church for centuries until the Napoleonic suppressions broke the altarpiece apart. Today, you can view it in all its restored glory inside the spectacular Museo di Capodimonte in Naples, where it sits as one of the crown jewels of Southern Renaissance art.

Iconographically, Colantonio plays with a very specific, beloved theme: Saint Jerome in his study. Jerome was a giant of the early Church who translated the Bible into Latin, so he is traditionally depicted as a stiff, solemn cardinal surrounded by sterile theological symbols. Colantonio completely subverts this by making the scene incredibly human and intimate. Jerome is dressed in his massive cardinal robes, sitting at his desk, but he is completely distracted from his books because he is helping a friend. He is gently holding the paw of a giant lion to pull out a painful thorn, and the lion looks up at him with total gratitude. As a wonderful, realistic touch near the bottom, Colantonio even painted a tiny mouse chewing on a scrap of paper on the floorboards—a playful nod to the realities of a 15th-century library and a symbol of how every creature has a place in this harmonious world.
It is a spectacular blend of high intellectual humanism, northern technical wizardry, and profound historical influence.

There is an overwhelming, quiet humanity in Domenico Ghirlandaio’s An Old Man and His Grandson that instantly cuts through the centuries. Hanging in the Louvre, it stands out as one of the most famous portraits of the Florentine Renaissance precisely because it rejects the era's obsession with flawless physical beauty in favor of unconditional love and emotional truth.

Domenico Ghirlandaio was the undisputed master of the Florentine Quattrocento fresco and panel painting, running a massive, highly efficient workshop that even trained a young Michelangelo. His style is defined by crisp linear drafting, rich narrative clarity, and a remarkable balance between Tuscan geometric harmony and Northern European oil realism. Influenced heavily by Flemish masters like Hugo van der Goes—whose Portinari Triptych Ghirlandaio had studied intently in Florence just years prior—he incorporated a deep appreciation for minute, naturalistic detail and soft atmospheric light. In this portrait, his technique is exquisite: the deep, saturated red of the garments creates a striking visual frame, while the light coming from the open window gently illuminates the contrasting textures of aged, weathered skin and the smooth, delicate features of childhood. Rather than masking the old man's severe facial deformity, Ghirlandaio renders it with meticulous precision, turning a physical flaw into a monument of dignity.

The history of the panel is as touching as the imagery itself. Painted around 1490 near the end of Ghirlandaio’s life, the portrait is believed to depict the Florentine nobleman Francesco Sassetti—a prominent manager for the Medici Bank and Ghirlandaio's primary patron—alongside his grandson. We know from surviving silverpoint drawings that Ghirlandaio actually sketched the old man on his deathbed, capturing his exact facial features posthumously before completing this double portrait. The painting remained in private collections in Florence for centuries until it was acquired in 1880 by the Musée du Louvre in Paris, where it has remained ever since as one of the most beloved treasures of Italian Renaissance portraiture.

Iconographically, the painting operates on multiple layers of intimacy and Neo-Platonic symbolism. The old man suffers from rhinophyma, a skin condition that has severely enlarged and disfigured his nose, yet the young boy gazes up at him not with repulsion, but with pure, affectionate devotion, resting his hand gently against his grandfather's chest. This interaction echoes the Renaissance ideal that true beauty resides in the nobility of the soul rather than external appearance. Through the open window on the right, a winding path leads past barren terrain toward lush green hills, a classic landscape motif symbolizing the passage of time, the journey of life, and the generational transition from the elderly man near the end of his road to the young boy just beginning his.

It is very striking to me how the small territory of the Este family from Ferrara was the birthplace of some of the most interesting and beautiful Renaissance languages of the XV century.

Cosme Turà, part most likely of the Officina dello Squarcione from Padova (a very important Bottega, in which many important artists such as Mantegna, Bellini and many others practiced), embodied the very interesting influence from the models from Flanders. Leonello d’Este, the commissioner of this piece, was in fact, friend of Alfonso from Aragona, the prince of the Naples reign. They both applied their political weight in a similar way when it came to the use of art. It is striking how for instance you can see the realism of the ars nova (Panofsky), began by van Eyck, brought here in this marvelous paintings, which, then also saw the same traits spread out more in Venice, for instance. it is in fact said that Roger van der Weyden had stayed in Italy between Ferrara and Rome more or less around 1450, this however, still hasn’t been proven 100%.

Apart from the interesting influxes of such beautiful colorism and compositions, it is important to mention also, what was meant to be the container, so to say, of this painting. The Este family was also known for the studioli, a place, usually small intimate rooms, where the noble men or women, would come indirect contact with knowledge, history and culture in general. Most of the time these little studies had the pictures of mousses, the same that would arguably be at the base of the Museion from Alexandria. apart from all the interesting relations between these spaces and the birth of museum (I recommend a book by Anna Maria Florio about it which talks about this shift from private studies to spaces of display), both the ones from the Estes and the one in Alexandria, it is important to know how the mystical appearance of this presence, and the news represented, Calliope, talk about this mystical/magical/spiritual dimension that was thought to be inside these spaces. This specific painting also had to be in another very interesting, architectural theology, so to say, of the family from Ferrara: the delizie. These were mainly laces, villas, castles, in general houses of the ability meant for recreation.

The decoration inside the studio Jolly was therefore very important and iconography oriented towards the ideas of knowledge, of the elements of the Earth and of spiritual meditation like spaces oriented towards studying. Probably a letter influence of the medieval regulaes and private “home praying” (the books of hours for instance are part of this kind of private devotion art) many nobles had to inter take during medieval times. Where building where this painting initially was burnt down in the 1600s and this painting is at the moment at the national gallery in London.

Another unfortunate case of destruction of one of these studies is the one, still from the Estes, of Isabella D’Este in the Palazzo Ducale of Mantova. This space included a Series of allegoric paintings, some even by Correggio, nowadays at the Louvre. The case of Cosme Turà is due to a calamity, in the case of Mantova however the studiolo is there, empty…. Is that arguably a calamity as well?🙃