Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints (Raphael)

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Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints

Raphael, 1504-1505

Tempera and gold on wood

172,4 × 172,4 cm

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City

The Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints, also known as the Colonna Altarpiece, is a painting by the Italian High Renaissance artist Raphael, circa 1504. It is housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City. It is the only altarpiece by Raphael in the United States.

The piece is a relatively early and transitional work by Raphael, painted for the convent of Sant'Antonio da Padova at Perugia. Raphael began work on it when he was barely 20 years old, just before he left for Florence in 1504, and he completed it the following year after he returned to Perugia. The piece shows clear elements of Raphael's early and his later Florentine style. The influence of his teacher Perugino can be seen in the conservative composition. But Raphael has infused into the stiffly posed group a breadth and dignity that reflects his knowledge of the work of Fra Bartolomeo in Florence. Particularly striking are Raphael's treatment of the Saints Peter and Paul, whose apparent volume fills the space at the sides of the main panel and the placement of the figures of God the Father and two angels, who symmetrically fill the curved shape of the altarpiece's lunette above the main panel, which is visble here.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art also has one of the paintings from the predella of the alterpiece, the agony in the garden. Other pieces of the predella can be found in the collections of the National Gallery, London, England and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, in Boston. Other pieces of the Colonna Altarpiece are in the Dulwich Picture Gallery, in London. A preparatory drawing by Raphael for the composition of the agony in the garden is in the collection of the Morgan Library in New York.

The Altarpiece was the last Raphael altar in private hands when J.P. Morgan purchased it in the early 20th century for a record price. Other previous owners include Queen Christina of Sweden and the aristocratic Colonna family in Rome, from whom the altarpiece takes its name.