The present work is a spectacular jewel-like canvas by Jacopo Amigoni. Rich in delicate pastel colors, it is most likely a modello for an altarpiece either lost or never painted. In it the Madonna stands firmly upon a cloud in the heavens, the Christ Child resting on a delicate veil further supported by a cloud, as he gently wraps his arm around his mother’s neck. From above angels prepare to lower flowers and a wreath, while other angels and seraphim surrounding the two joyfully cavort.

Amigoni was one of the leading proponents of the Venetian Rocco style on the international stage. He was a peripatetic artist, and after completing his training in Venice he spent the majority of his career abroad, with long stints in southern Germany (1715-1729), England (1729-1739), and, in the final part of his life, in Spain (1747-1752). Between his periods in England and in Spain, where he served as court painter to King Ferdinand VI, Amigoni returned to Venice. After a nearly a quarter century outside Italy, Amigoni absorbed the influence of the contemporary Venetian painting, which had grown ever grander and more resplendent during the artist’s absence. He was clearly looking closely at the works of Giambattista Tiepolo, and the brilliant light effects found in works from this period were undoubtedly influenced by the younger artist’s aesthetics. The present painting is one of the first fruits of this moment of development, and it stands out for the creaminess of the paint, the rich impasto, and the soft palette—particularly in the beautifully observed wreath, a sonorous chorus of colors.

Dr. Annalisa Scarpa, author of the forthcoming monograph on Jacopo Amigoni has confirmed the attribution of the present painting to the artist (written communication, 7 April 2015), and suggests that it was painted in Venice just after Amigoni’s return from England in 1739. While likening the lifelike treatment of the angels to the putti that often populate the large mythological paintings of Amigoni’s English period, she suggests that the present picture should be dated just before the artist’s Madonna and Child with Saint Francis de Sales in the Church of Santa Maria della Consolazione, known as the Chiesa di Santa Maria della Fava, Venice—a work dated 1743.