Saint Benedict: Left wing

This figure of Saint Benedict reading was painted in 1487 as one wing of a small triptych, a hinged altarpiece built to fold shut and travel. Benedict of Nursia, the monk whose rule shaped Western monasticism, appears calm and absorbed in his book, robed in the dark habit of his order. He was chosen because he was the name-saint of the man who commissioned the work, and the whole set was shipped from Bruges to Florence for the church of Sant'Egidio, inside the great hospital of Santa Maria Nuova. Behind the saint runs a stretch of landscape that once continued across all three panels, so that saint, Virgin and donor shared a single view of open country. That unity ended when the pieces were split up. The central panel went to Berlin, and this saint stayed in Florence beside the donor's portrait.