Artwork
Virgin and Child with Saints and Donors
Virgin and Child with Saints and Donors is an oil painting by the Venetian Renaissance artist Giovanni Battista Cima da Conegliano. It dates from 1515 and is held in the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art.
About this work
Subject & Meaning
The female donor’s accompanying saint, possibly Lucy or Mary Magdalene, extends an empty hand, indicating an unfinished attribute or symbolic gesture.
The painting depicts the Virgin Mary holding the Christ Child, flanked by saints and the kneeling donors, a married couple who likely commissioned the work for private devotion. The male donor is presented by Anthony the Great (Saint Anthony Abate), suggesting his name or veneration. The female donor’s accompanying saint, possibly Lucy or Mary Magdalene, extends an empty hand, indicating an unfinished attribute or symbolic gesture.
The central sacred figures embody maternal care and divine grace, while the donors’ inclusion reflects pious commemoration and intercessory prayer. The unfinished attribute underscores the work’s devotional purpose, emphasizing spiritual aspiration over formal completion.
Technique & Style
The painting is executed in oil on a wooden panel measuring 56 × 78.8 cm, completed in 1515. Its handling exhibits the characteristic Cima palette, soft, luminous glazes and delicate modeling, with a refined interplay of light across drapery and flesh tones. Compositionally, the Virgin and Child occupy a central, hierarchically scaled space, flanked by saints and donor portraits in a symmetrical arrangement.
The figures are rendered with precise anatomical definition yet idealized contours, and the landscape background recedes through atmospheric perspective. The work’s formal qualities combine Venetian High Renaissance clarity with a lingering Gothic linearity in the drapery folds. Condition reports note areas of incompletion, particularly in the right-hand saint’s attribute, suggesting the painting remained unfinished.
History & Provenance
The Virgin and Child with Saints and Donors is dated 1515 and attributed to Giovanni Battista Cima da Conegliano. It was likely commissioned for private devotion by a married couple whose portraits appear at the lower left and right; the male donor may have been named Antonio, suggested by the presence of Anthony the Great at his side. The painting entered the Cleveland Museum of Art, where it remains. Technical notes indicate the work was left incomplete, notably in the right-hand female saint’s empty gesture.
Virgin and Child with Saints and Donors is housed in the Cleveland Museum of Art in Cleveland, Ohio. The work is recorded as part of the museum’s collection, but the available references do not provide a specific inventory or accession number. The painting was created in 1515, as documented, and its display within the museum’s galleries is not detailed in the cited sources, so no exhibition history can be confirmed from the provided material.
Context
Executed in 1515, this oil-on-panel measures 56 × 78.8 cm and resides in the Cleveland Museum of Art. It portrays the Virgin and Child flanked by saints and donor portraits, a composition typical of early‑16th‑century Venetian private devotion. Contemporary scholarship situates the work within Cima da Conegliano’s mature period, noting its blend of Lombard naturalism and Venetian colourism, and observes that the painting appears unfinished, particularly in the handling of the right‑hand saint who lacks an attribute.
The attribution to Cima and his workshop is documented in both museum records and scholarly literature, underscoring its significance in the artist’s corpus.
Overview
This devotional painting, titled Virgin and Child with Saints and Donors, was created by the Italian artist Cima da Conegliano in 1515. Executed in oil on panel, the work is now housed in the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art in Ohio. It presents a traditional religious subject, depicting the Madonna and Christ Child accompanied by various holy figures and the individuals who commissioned the artwork.
Own this work as a print
Artist & collection
Artist
Giovanni Battista Cima da Conegliano
Giovanni Battista Cima, also called Cima da Conegliano (c. 1459 – c. 1517), was an Italian Renaissance painter, who mostly worked in Venice. He can be considered part of the Venetian school, though he was also…
