Virgin and Child

Ercole de' Roberti's Virgin and Child, painted in 1490-96, is a late devotional work by the leading painter of Ferrara in the late fifteenth century. Ercole succeeded Cosme Tura and Francesco del Cossa as the dominant artist in the Este court, developing a highly personal style marked by angular, expressive forms and intense emotional content. His Madonnas possess a nervous energy and psychological intensity unusual in devotional painting of this period.

Ercole's technique in tempera or oil on panel shows his characteristic angular, somewhat agitated line and intense, saturated color. The figures have the tense, expressive quality unique to the Ferrarese school, with sharply defined features and restless drapery patterns.