Maestà (Madone avec Anges et Saints)
Duccio, 1308-11
Détrempe sur bois 214 x 412 cm (recto)
Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Siena

La Madone apparaît comme la Reine du Ciel et de Sienne. Au premier plan les quatre saints patrons de Siene sont agenouillés.

L'inscription latine sur la base du trône contient le nom du peintre.

Le tableau est resté le maître-autel de la Cathédrale de Siene jusqu'à 1505. Plus tard les panneaux de la predelle ont été séparées.

in 1308 Duccio achieved the consummation of his career with the contract for the huge Maestà for the High Altar of the Cathedral. The work was finished in 1311 and carried in solemn procession from his workshop to the Cathedral. Most of it is still in Siena (Cathedral Museum), but a few small panels are missing, and the other panels, all small ones from the predelle, are in several foreign museums.

In its original form the Maestà proper - that is, the Enthroned Madonna and Child surrounded by Saints and Angels - occupied the whole of the main panel facing the congregation. Above and below were scenes from the Life of Christ and the Virgin, with small figures of Saints. Most of these smaller scenes would have been visible only to the officiating priest. The whole of the back of the main panel was taken up by twenty-six scenes from the Passion, while above and below, as on the front, were smaller panels with scenes from the Life of Christ. While the front is principally an icon for devout contemplation, the narrative cycle may have been visible only to those in the sanctuary, or perhaps the ambulatory. For this reason, the narrative may act as a commentary on Scripture.

From the artistic point of view both sides show Duccio as a profound innovator, for the front has figures of greater weight and solidity, and more characterization, than had been seen previously in Siena; while the back shows him as a master of narrative, equal to Giotto in his power of story-telling though less fresh in iconographical invention, for Duccio was content to use the old Byzantine models for most (though not all) of his scenes from the New Testament. The superb craftsmanship, the use of gold as a decoration and a compositional feature at the same time, the rich and subtle colour which is made into an aesthetic feature in its own right, rather than treated (as in Giotto's works) as explaining the forms, and above all the use of varied and elegant outlines as a surface pattern as well as a description of form: all these features characterized the Sienese School for nearly two centuries.