Madonna con Gesù Bambino in gloria, i quattro dottori della Chiesa e San Giovanni Evangelista

This large-scale devotional composition—a Madonna with the Christ Child in Glory, the Four Doctors of the Church, and Saint John the Evangelist—painted around 1550 for Santa Maria Maggiore in Bergamo, represents Moroni's engagement with the most ambitious altarpiece conventions of the period. The subject type—a heavenly vision of the Virgin and Child combined with a lower zone of saints and doctors—derives from the Sacra Conversazione tradition but elevates it into a theophany: the divine appearing to the assembled saints. The Four Doctors of the Church (Ambrose, Augustine, Gregory, and Jerome) were the theological pillars of Western Christianity, and their inclusion gave altarpieces of this type a specific doctrinal weight appropriate to a major basilica. Moroni's ability to organise this complex multi-figure composition while maintaining individual characterisation for each saint reflects his ambitions at the outset of his mature career.

Large-scale canvas with oil medium, the composition is structured vertically to distinguish the heavenly zone (Virgin and Child) from the earthly zone (saints below). Each of the Doctors carries his identifying attributes, rendered with Moroni's material specificity. The colour organisation likely uses cooler, more luminous tones for the heavenly figures and warmer, more terrestrial colours for the earthly saints.