Florentine School. Fellow pupil of Leonardo and Perugino in the School of Verrocchio.
PARIS, LOUVRE
THE MADONNA AND TWO SAINTS The Virgin is seated on a throne with the Child on her knees, who turns towards the left in the act of blessing St. Julian the Hospitaller, who stands with clasped hands. On the right is St. Nicholas, Bishop of Myra, reading a book. In the background an entrance hall with elaborately wrought pilasters forming arcades.
Painted in 1508 for the Church of Cestello (now Santa Maddelena dei Pazzi) in Florence.
“The best work that Lorenzo ever did, the one in which he was most careful and studious to check himself.” (Vasari.)
FLORENCE, ACADEMY
THE ADORATION OF THE SHEPHERDS The Child lies on the ground in the centre before the open ruins of the stable, the Virgin kneeling in adoration on the right and the bareheaded shepherds on the left. Behind the Virgin stand two angels, and two other kneel at her sides, and on the extreme right St. Joseph stands leaning on his staff. Behind the kneeling shepherd is another with hands upraised, and on the extreme left another young one standing with a lamb in his arms. The foreground is of grass dotted with flowers.
“In his youth Lorenzo painted for the nuns of Santa Chiara a Nativity in which the flowers are so marvellously rendered that one might think them real.” (Vasari.)