성 미카엘

In 1454 Piero della Francesca signed a contract to paint the high altarpiece for the church of Sant'Agostino in Borgo Sansepolcro, the small Tuscan town where he was born, and he was still finishing it 15 years later. This panel of the Archangel Michael stood just to the left of a central Virgin that has since been lost. Piero shows the warrior angel as a calm young man in Roman armor and soft leather boots, having just beheaded the devil, whom he paints as a horned serpent still dangling from one hand. Over the centuries the altarpiece was taken apart, and its surviving pieces are now split between five museums in four countries, this one among the strangers in London.