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31 The Virgin and Child surrounded by Five Angels

This work by Sandro Botticelli, one of the leading painters of the Italian Renaissance in the second half of the fifteenth century, is thought to have been painted shortly after he established his own workshop in his mid-twenties. In it, the Virgin Mary sits on the ground with the infant Jesus on her lap. This iconography, called the Madonna of Humility, spread from Italy throughout Europe in the early fifteenth century. Mary holds a pomegranate, a fruit symbolizing Christ’s Passion, and she offers it to Jesus with one hand. White lilies can be found in the background, symbolizing the purity of the Virgin Mary, along with angels holding floral wreaths. The skillfully depicted drapery, visible around Mary’s knees and in the lower body of the angel on the left, helps give the figures a sense of volume. Such stylistic elements suggest that the artist may have studied classical sculpture.