Madonna and Child 1510

Curator: This is Ambrogio Bergognone’s "Madonna and Child," dating from around 1510, currently held at the Museo Poldi Pezzoli in Milan. Editor: I'm immediately struck by the contrasts—the cool detachment in the Madonna’s face, juxtaposed against the baby’s somewhat serious gaze. The red rosary beads and fabric provide an almost jarring visual counterpoint to the otherwise muted tones. Curator: Bergognone was a master of the late Quattrocento style, deeply influenced by the Lombard school, yet with a grace all his own. I can feel this mix myself…I think it is worth to consider how in a region of constant material exchange and labour one thinks about sacred concepts. Editor: Speaking of materials, this being an oil painting gives it such richness of surface. The layering of pigments would have been meticulous, especially to achieve that luminous quality in the faces. Oil was increasingly favored as it afforded a slower drying time, thus greater capacity for reworking the image to achieve ever greater naturalism, if a version of it. I bet the making of this work would involve diverse workshops where a guild member, say Bergognone, coordinates labor of all the members towards an economic goal with both ritual, artisanal, and sacred components. Curator: The serene, almost melancholy air is classic Bergognone, though. The architectural backgrounds are so curious, aren't they? Tiny almost theatrical settings flanking them. It's not realism, not in that modern sense of realism; it feels staged, like a beautiful memory. Editor: Interesting point. Considering the era, who was commissioning art like this, and for what spaces? It might have influenced Bergognone choices, because it does feel like a piece constructed for display, for wealth demonstration purposes... Those backgrounds feel almost like an assertion, proof of some urban association. Curator: I agree! Still I look at this "Madonna and Child" and don’t see any social pretense here...Instead I sense, at last, just deep care in the rendering of those eyes. And that alone... Editor: Ultimately, yes! Perhaps we read this art too much under the lense of economic value. However, taking care of a creative work requires, among other, economic maintenance too...I see it like one another material facet of its survival as more than simply an image.