A Group of Poor Clares

Ambrogio Lorenzetti's A Group of Poor Clares (c. 1329) depicts members of the Franciscan order founded by Saint Clare of Assisi, reflecting the powerful influence of mendicant spirituality on Sienese art. The panel likely formed part of a larger altarpiece commissioned for a Clarissan convent, where such images reinforced communal devotion. Lorenzetti's sensitivity to group dynamics and spatial arrangement anticipates his later civic frescoes in the Palazzo Pubblico.

Executed in egg tempera on poplar panel with tooled gold ground, the work features carefully individualized faces within a tightly composed group. Lorenzetti employs subtle tonal modulations in the habits to distinguish the figures spatially.