Madonna with Child between Saints Jerome and Francis

This is one of Benedetto Diana's earliest dated works, marked 1486, when he was still in his twenties. It follows a scheme every Venetian painter knew, the Virgin and Child between two saints, here Jerome the desert scholar and Francis, who bore the wounds of Christ. What makes it recognisably his is the handling. Where the older Giovanni Bellini gave such scenes a soft, warm calm, Diana chose a cooler palette and firmer shadows, so his figures carry a plainer, more physical weight. That harder, more sculptural light is already there in the faces of the two saints, painted by an artist not yet 30.