Madonna and Child and Two Angels

Among Botticelli's earliest surviving works, this Madonna and Child with Two Angels at the Museo di Capodimonte in Naples was painted around 1465-1470 when he was still deeply under the influence of his master Filippo Lippi. The tender maternal image, with its soft modeling and the gentle warmth radiating between mother, child, and attendant angels, reflects the humanizing approach to religious art that Lippi had pioneered and that Botticelli would develop into one of the most distinctive visions of the Virgin in European painting. The work predates the mythological masterpieces of the Medici period and shows the young Botticelli already displaying the graceful line that would become his trademark.

The early work shows Lippi's direct influence in the tender, naturalistic treatment of the figures, with Botticelli's emerging personal style barely visible in the slightly more refined contours.