Virgin and Child, with Saints Apollonia and Sebastian

Davide Ghirlandaio, who was Domenico's younger brother and principal workshop assistant, continuing the family workshop after Domenico's death in 1494, created this work around 1490, now in the Philadelphia Museum of Art. The depiction of the Virgin and Child was the single most common subject in Italian Renaissance art, serving as a focus for both private devotion and public worship. This work belongs to the High Renaissance, when the innovations of the preceding century were synthesized into works of monumental clarity and ideal beauty.

The Madonna's pose and the Christ Child's gestures follow codified devotional types, with the artist investing these conventional forms with individual character through subtle variations in expression and color.