(Foligno active mid-15th Century)
Madonna and Child,
tempera on panel, gold ground, 42.5 x 38 cm, framed

Provenance:
with Grassi Gallery, Florence;
Collection Dan Fellows Platt (1873–1938), Englewood, New Jersey;
by inheritance to his widow Ethel Bliss Platt (1881–1971), Engelwood, New Jersey;
possibly her sale, Parke Bernet Galleries, New York, 15 November 1945;
Collection Jacob Heimann, New York;
Anne R. and Amy Putnam, given to the museum in 1948;
San Diego Museum of Art (formerly Fine Arts Gallery), San Diego, California;
deaccessioned and their sale, Sotheby’s New York, 10 January 1991,
lot 4 (as North Italian School, late 15th Century, with measurements 36.8 x 31.7 cm, sold for $ 49.500);
Private Collection, Northern Italy

Literature:
Fine Arts Gallery of San Diego, Catalogue, 1960, p. 64 (as Pier Antonio Mezzastri);
B. Fredericksen, F. Zeri, Census of Pre-Nineteenth Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections, Cambridge 1972, p. 25 (as attributed to Benozzo Gozzoli);
F. Todini, La Pittura Umbra dal Duecento al primo Cinquecento, Milan 1989, vol. I, p. 115 and vol. II, fig. 934 (as Maestro di Cola delle Casse)

The present devotional panel represents the Madonna and Child on a gold ground. The Mother is shown half-length, holding the Child in her arms, wrapped in white swaddling clothes. He gently reaches out to her face with both hands. Christ’s halo, which is finely represented in perspective, is typical of the Umbrian figurative tradition.

The present work was attributed by Filippo Todini to the Master of Cola delle Casse, who was named after the patron of the frescoes in the chapel of the same name, in the church of Santa Maria in Campis in Foligno, executed between 1454 and 1460, where this, as yet, anonymous painter is thought to have contributed to part of the decoration. Some scholars have suggested identifying the artist as Pierantonio Mezzastris, a follower of Benozzo Gozzoli, who was profoundly influenced by the latter master’s celebrated frescoes at Montefalco, Perugia executed in the early 1460s.

The features of the Virgin and Child in the present painting recall the Tuscan figurative tradition to such an extent that Federico Zeri and Burton Fredericksen considered an attribution, although with some reservations, to Benozzo Gozzoli himself (see literature).

According to Filippo Todini, the Master of Cola delle Casse was active in Foligno around the mid-fifteenth century, and was most probably the founder of the local school in the Renaissance style and it is possible that he may be identifiable with Pietro Mazzaforte, who is documented from 1444 to 1480. The Master of Cola delle Casse is the author of numerous frescoes around Foligno, and of devotional panels that are marked-out by the painter’s deeply expressive style, which was influenced by the work of Fra Angelico, Masolino and Piero della Francesca.