Cleveland Museum of Art

Virgin and Child with the Infant Saint John

Date

1500–1520

Medium

engraving

Culture

Italy, 16th century

Department

Prints

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

Active in the early 1500s, the Florentine engraver Cristofano Robetta relied on paintings, frescoes, and works on paper by both Italian and northern European artists, borrowing motifs, figures, and settings with varying degrees of faithfulness. Paintings and drawings by the Florentine artist, Filippino Lippi, were a primary source of inspiration. In this engraving, the central figures of the Virgin, Child, and Saint John derive from Filippino’s Holy Family tondo, though the printmaker replaced the Saints Margaret and Joseph with angels. Trained as a goldsmith, Robetta’s engraving style consists of extremely fine lines combined with crosshatching and dots.

The authoritative record is held by Cleveland Museum of Art. LinkedCulture surfaces this object and its connections; it does not alter institutional metadata.