Madonna of the Magnificat

The Madonna of the Magnificat, Italian: Madonna del Magnificat, is a painting of circular or tondo form by the Italian Renaissance painter Sandro Botticelli. It is now in the galleries of the Uffizi, in Florence.

Madonna of the Magnificat
ArtistSandro Botticelli
Year1481
MediumTempera
Dimensions118 cm × 119 cm (46 in × 47 in)
LocationUffizi, Florence

The work portrays the Virgin Mary crowned by two angels. She is writing the opening of the Magnificat on the right-hand page of a book; on the left page is part of the Benedictus. In her left hand she holds a pomegranate.[1] Mary is thought to be a portrait of Lucrezia Tornabuoni, wife of Piero de' Medici, and the two angels holding the book to be her sons Lorenzo and Giuliano. In his book 'The Agony and The Ecstasy', about Michelangelo's life, the writer Irving Stone, who spent several years living in Florence, Italy, claims that the painting was actually made for the Medici family at the time.

History

The history of the painting is not known. It was acquired by the Uffizi in 1785 from Ottavio Magherini.[2] It may have come from one of the many monasteries suppressed by the Archduke Pietro Leopoldo. It has been identified with the tondo in the church of San Francesco al Monte mentioned by Vasari and Bocchi, but the description does not coincide and this identification is usually rejected. There are several copies of the painting, including one in the Louvre, one in the Pierpont Morgan Library in New York.[3]

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References
  1. Susan Schibanoff (March 1994). "Botticelli's Madonna del Magnificat: Constructing the Woman Writer in Early Humanist Italy". PMLA 109(2): 190-206. (subscription required)
  2. N. Inv. 1609: Filipepi Alessandro detto Botticelli, bibliografia. Centro di Documentazione, Polo Museale Fiorentino. (in Italian) Accessed May 2013.
  3. N. Cat. 00188562: Botticelli; Madonna con Bambino e angeli. Centro di Documentazione, Polo Museale Fiorentino. (in Italian) Accessed May 2013.


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