Page:The painters of Florence from the thirteenth to the sixteenth century (1915).djvu/181

John in the background, which Fra Lippo painted for Cosimo's wife. This subject is repeated with a figure of St. Bernard and a finely wooded landscape in the background, in a lovely picture at Berlin, which may have been the altar-piece that once adorned the chapel in the Medici Palace, where Benozzo Gozzoli painted his frescoes of the Journey of the Three Kings to Bethlehem. It was evidently a favourite with the Medici, and we find a third version in another altar-piece which Fra Lippo painted by their command, for the nunnery of Annalena. But of all the works which he executed for these generous patrons, the best-known is the delightful little Uffizi picture of two boy-angels holding up the Child before his Mother, who sits with clasped hands, in front of an open window. The muslin frills of the fair-haired Virgin's veil, the chubby-faced Child stretching out his little arms to his Mother, above all the mischievous look in the eyes of the boy-angel with white tunic and purple wings, who is said to represent the young Lorenzo de' Medici, are all in Fra Filippo's happiest manner. Through the open window we see a river winding its way over rich plains, and on the rocky heights beyond we catch a glimpse of distant towers steeped in the glow of the evening sun. Fra Lippo excelled in designing these small pictures for household altars, and was one of the first to adopt the round form, or tondo, which became so popular with Florentine painters and sculptors. An admirable example of this class of picture by his hand is the Madonna and Child with the pomegranate, in the Pitti. As before, Masaccio's influence is apparent in the model-