Madonna col Bambino e santi

Mantegna was about 70 when this was painted, near the year 1500 and near the end of a long career spent almost entirely in the service of one family, the Gonzaga rulers of Mantua. By then he had been their court artist for more than 30 years. The Virgin sits with the Christ Child while the infant John the Baptist leans in at her knee, his little scroll reading Ecce Agnus Dei, and saints gather to either side, Catherine of Alexandria with her wheel among them. It is a quieter, more devotional picture than the sharp classical scenes of his younger years. The top left corner is badly damaged now, yet the faces keep the hard, sculpted clarity that Mantegna never gave up, even at the very end.