Giorgio Schiavone

A female saint clasps a martyr’s palm and a richly bound book. We don't know who she was meant to be, but her wrinkled skin shows that she was no longer young. Although her clothing is restrained she is dressed as a laywoman, not a nun, and was clearly well educated: in medieval art books were sy...

A friar stands on a marble plinth, holding a lily and a book. This is a thirteenth-century saint, Antony of Padua. He wears the grey habit of the Observants, a strict, reformed branch of the Franciscans, an order of friars founded by Saint Francis of Assisi.The book symbolises Saint Anthony’s le...

An old man in a grey habit, cheeks sunken and toothless mouth drawn down, clasps his hands in prayer. This is Bernardino of Siena, the most famous and charismatic Italian preacher of the early fifteenth century. On his chest is a red medallion with gold lettering; it reads ‘IHS’, the monogram of...

This elegant blonde woman with a jewelled crown and a martyr’s palm is Saint Catherine of Alexandria. She rests her left hand on the edge of the spiked wheel, just visible in the corner – she was tortured on one, and it became her attribute (a symbol traditionally associated with her).The strang...

This impressively bearded figure is a fourth-century saint, Jerome, one of the Fathers of the Christian Church. He holds several books – symbolising his extensive writings, including the first official translation of the Bible into Latin – and a stone.A red hat held on by a string hangs down his...

A saint dressed in an animal skin stands on a marble plinth, holding a cross and a scroll. This is John the Baptist, the biblical hermit saint.John was usually shown in a camel-hair shirt with long hair and a beard, alluding to the years he spent in the desert, punishing his body with uncomfortab...

A saint holding a lily and a book gazes upwards, seemingly untroubled by the curved knife which splits his skull and the dagger in his shoulder. His hair is tonsured (shaved) to show that he was a member of a religious order, and he wears the black and white uniform of the Dominicans. This is Pet...

This elegant and rather haughty young man dressed in fifteenth-century fashion is in fact an early Christian saint and martyr. Sebastian was a Roman soldier who secretly converted to Christianity and was executed for his faith by the Emperor Diocletian.He comes from the upper level of a large pol...

The dead Christ, wrapped in his shroud, is held upright in a marble tomb by two grieving angels. This painting comes from a large altarpiece made in the middle of the fifteenth century by Giorgio Schiavone, possibly for the church of San Niccolò in Padua.This way of showing Christ was based on a...

The Virgin and Christ Child are framed by a classical marble arch decorated with swags of fruit. Christ balances precariously on the sill, uncertain on his feet; his anxious mother clearly thinks he is about to fall off the edge. In a gesture familiar to all parents of toddlers, she holds her han...

The Virgin Mary sits on a grand throne, a chubby Christ Child balancing precariously on her knee. This is the central panel of a large polyptych (multi-panelled altarpiece) painted by Giorgio Schiavone, probably for the church of San Niccolò in Padua.This altarpiece sits on the cusp of the shift...