Christ on the Cross Between Mary Magdalene, the Virgin, Saint John, and Saint Bernardo degli Uberti

Andrea di Giusto was a Florentine painter of the second quarter of the fifteenth century who worked closely with Masaccio and Paolo Uccello without fully absorbing their spatial revolutions, remaining closer to the International Gothic tradition of Lorenzo Monaco. His Crucifixion with Magdalene, the Virgin, John, and Saint Bernardo degli Uberti — a Vallombrosan cardinal — was likely painted for a Vallombrosan foundation, as Bernardo's inclusion points directly to a patron connection with the reformed Benedictine order whose cardinal he was.

Andrea di Giusto sets the Crucifixion against a gold ground while introducing a low horizon line with distant hills — a hybrid of the conservative gold-ground convention and the emerging naturalistic landscape. The figures are taller and more linear than Masaccio's monumental types, reflecting his primary debt to the Lorenzo Monaco tradition.