Mystic Marriage of Saint Catherine with Saint Peter, and Stories of Saint Catherine

Defendente Ferrari dated his pictures often enough that the years around this one can almost be counted. Two altarpieces carry the date 1519, one now in Ciriè, north-west of Turin, the other in the sacristy of Ivrea cathedral, and dated works follow in 1520, 1521 and 1522. This altarpiece, two metres tall, belongs to those years, and the Galleria Sabauda places it around 1519.

At the centre the Christ Child, on his mother's lap, takes Saint Catherine of Alexandria as his bride, the scene known as her mystic marriage, while Saint Peter reads from a book. Along the base, small scenes tell Catherine's story.

The museum points out that this enthroned Virgin and Child was one of Defendente's most successful designs. Output on that scale needed a team, and assistants working under his control used the drawings kept in the workshop to repeat his inventions again and again.