Roundel of the Crucifixion and the Coronation of the Virgin

Roundel of the Crucifixion and the Coronation of the Virgin, painted around 1440 and held in the Museum of San Marco, is a double-sided or diptych-format devotional work that places two of the most theologically significant moments of Christ's life in paired relationship: his death and the glorification of his mother. The circular format—the roundel—was unusual in Fra Angelico's oeuvre and reflects the influence of Byzantine or Northern European devotional objects. The juxtaposition of Crucifixion and Coronation encapsulates the entire arc of Christian salvation: sacrifice and triumph.

The circular format imposes unusual compositional constraints, requiring the complex multi-figure scenes of both the Crucifixion and the Coronation to be compressed into a geometrically bounded field. Fra Angelico uses concentric organisation and careful figure arrangement to make each scene legible within its circular boundary.