Saint Paul with Paolo Pagagnotti; Christ Appearing to His Mother

The Master of the Cologne Legend of Saint Ursula was an anonymous painter working in Cologne around 1400–1420 who produced a celebrated cycle of panels depicting Ursula's pilgrimage and martyrdom for Saint Ursula's church in Cologne, where the supposed bones of Ursula and her eleven thousand virgin companions were enshrined. The unusual panel combining Saint Paul with the Florentine banker Paolo Pagagnotti and a Christ Appearing to His Mother suggests a personalised devotional commission in which the donor's name-saint Paul is accompanied by a vision drawn from extra-canonical Passion devotion.

The Master works in tempera on gold ground, his figures characterised by the soft, pensive Cologne type — rounded faces with lidded eyes and small mouths. The Christ Appearing to His Mother is a devotional image type more common in devotio moderna literature than in visual art, suggesting a sophisticated patron familiar with mystical devotional texts.