Annunciation

Bartolomeo Vivarini's 1472 Annunciation was produced at a pivotal moment in the painter's career when he was actively assimilating influences from mainland Italy while maintaining the workshop traditions established by his older brother Antonio. Bartolomeo had by this point largely abandoned the gold ground in favour of architectural settings, placing the Annunciation scene within a loggia or domestic interior in the manner that had become standard in Florentine and Paduan painting. Vivarini's Annunciations from this decade show a careful study of how Mantegna and the Ferrarese painters constructed illusionistic space through tiled floors and receding architecture. The panel's destination was almost certainly a Venetian or mainland altarpiece from which it has since been separated.

Bartolomeo Vivarini deploys a precise tiled floor in the Mantegnesque manner, its convergence lines giving the scene spatial credibility without relying on elaborate architectural framing. Gabriel's wings show careful gradation from deep brown at the base through golden ochre to near-white tips. The Virgin's garments are rendered in layered ultramarine with careful white highlights describing the fold ridges.