Adoration of the Shepherds

This Adoration of the Shepherds by Sebastiano del Piombo, painted around 1511 and held in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, dates from the transitional moment when the artist was leaving Venice for Rome. The subject — shepherds arriving to worship the newborn Christ — was one of the great set-pieces of Renaissance religious painting. Sebastiano's treatment reflects his Venetian training in the warm palette and atmospheric effects, while hinting at the monumentality he would develop in Rome. The painting provides important evidence of his style at the moment of transition between his two artistic homes.

The nocturnal setting allows Sebastiano to demonstrate the atmospheric light effects he learned from Giorgione, with warm candlelight illuminating the figures against deep shadow. The rich Venetian palette and the soft modeling of forms create a mood of intimate reverence, while the substantial physicality of the figures anticipates his later Roman monumentality.