Madonna della gatta

Giulio Romano began this while he was still the youngest star in Raphael's Rome workshop, probably before Raphael died in 1520, and finished it a few years later on his own. For centuries people credited it to Raphael himself, which tells you how close the pupil came. The pyramid of figures owes something to Leonardo and to the master, though the mood is Giulio's own. It takes its nickname from the cat slinking through the foreground. Vasari saw the picture in Mantua in 1566 and simply called it the painting with the cat, and the name stuck.