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| Raphael The Alba Madonna 1511 Oil on canvas, diameter 98 cm National Gallery of Art, Washington |
Michaelangelo The Holy Family with the infant St. John the Baptist (the Doni tondo) c. 1503 Tempera on panel, Diameter 120 cm Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence |
| The painting is a perfect expression of the Renaissance art theory. Harmony and balance of design are found in Raphael's ability to stabilize the circular form of the painting with a triangular arrangement of the figures and the strong horizontal line behind them, composed of the river and trees. | Highly significant of the artist's style, the group with the Virgin, Saint Joseph and the Child shows the peculiar twisting of the limbs and the evidence given to body's muscles, a pattern that clearly appears in michelangiolesque sculpture. Brightness of colours, lighting effects, emphasize impressiveness of the sacred figures. The nudes on the background, whose poses and gestures are all connected to classical sculptures, symbolize pagan mankind, the world before coming of Christ; on the right the little saint John indicates the passage, through the baptism, from the pagan age to the christian age. Michelangelo himself projected and maybe worked the frame, where, as well as the Strozzi coat of arms (three half moon), are the Saviour's head in the upper side and four head explained as prophets, sybils or angels. |
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| Rembrandt The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne 1510 Oil on wood, 168,5 x 130 cm Musée du Louvre, Paris |
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| The theme of the Christ Child on the knee of the Virgin, who is herself seated on St Anne's lap, is fairly rare, but examples of it can be found from the Middle Ages onwards - the stream of life flowing through three generations. The paint is applied thinly, it is limpid and transparent, so that in some places the underlying sketch is visible. | |
