The Vision of Saint Bernard

The Vision of Saint Bernard (1486), in the Badia Fiorentina in Florence where it was painted for placement in the monastic church, depicts the Cistercian founder's famous mystical encounter with the Virgin Mary. Bernard of Clairvaux was one of the most influential theological writers of medieval Europe, and his Marian devotion gave rise to some of the most tender mystical writing of the twelfth century. Lippi's altarpiece was painted for the Della Pugliese family chapel and has remained in its original setting, making it one of the rare Florentine Renaissance altarpieces still in situ — and one of his uncontested masterpieces.

Lippi organises the vision as an intrusion of the sacred into a rocky, landscape-embedded space: the Virgin and her attendants materialize from the upper left while Bernard kneels at his book below right. The diagonal movement created by this spatial drama is carefully balanced by the cluster of angel figures and the architectural ledge at left.