Crucifixion

This Crucifixion by the Master of Monte Oliveto, painted around 1310, is the work of an anonymous Sienese painter named after works in the Olivetan monastery near Siena. The Master of Monte Oliveto was a contemporary of Duccio who worked in a style transitional between the older Byzantine conventions and the new Sienese Gothic manner. Now in the Cincinnati Art Museum, the panel reflects the early evolution of Sienese painting during the formative decade when Duccio's innovations were transforming local artistic practice.

Egg tempera on gold-ground panel with the schematic figural style and rigid symmetry characteristic of early Trecento Sienese painting before Duccio's full influence took hold. The Christ figure retains Byzantine proportions while the mourning figures show tentative Gothic naturalism.