Saints Bartholomew and Francis of Assisi

In 1498 Francesco Morone painted these two saints on separate panels for San Bernardino, the Franciscan church of Verona, and he treated them almost as opposites. Bartholomew, the apostle said to have been flayed alive, grips the knife of his martyrdom. His tunic is a sharp yellow against a violet mantle and a black ground, the kind of hard, bright colour the museum calls typical of Verona and quite unlike the painting of Venice.

Francis is held to near monochrome, a dun habit against the dark, and here light does the work that colour does next to him. It falls on his hands, where the wounds of the stigmata show, with a care the museum compares to Flemish painting. The museum reads the faces the same way. Francis looks hesitant and withdrawn, while Bartholomew turns a bold, almost arrogant glance to one side.