Andrea Meldolla, called Schiavone

Purchased in Europe by members of the Garret Club in honor of their friend and fellow member, Helen Holland Keating, circa 1925, and in situ at their headquarters in Buffalo, New York until the present day. 

As stated in the catalogue note, this painting was most likely cut down and probably once formed the center portion of a "sacra conversazione" composition. canvas has been tightly relined and the surface has been pressed as a result. there is noticeable thinness in the foliage at upper canvas and in the background area at upper right. ultraviolet light reveals scattered retouching throughout the composition: on both figures, with a concentration on the face of the Christ child, and throughout background, especially the areas surrounding Christ child. this painting has been pulled together, but still presents a strong image and there is no need for further work. In a parcel-gilt tabernacle frame with "Ave Maria Grazia" printed along bottom.
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The present painting appears to have been cut down and is likely the central portion of a sacra conversazione.  This explains why the Virgin and Christ Child each look in opposite directions, as if interacting with people just outside the limits of the canvas.  It is also interesting to note this work's similarities with another Madonna and Child by Schiavone, which is recorded in Richardson's monograph on the artist.¹  That work, larger in size than the present picture, is one of two depictions of the Virgin and Child with no accompanying figures that is recorded in the inventory that the sculptor Alessandro Vittoria, Schiavone's friend and executor, made after the artist's death. Indeed, there is good reason to connect these paintings since in both, the Madonna is dressed in rose-colored robes with a blue-gray mantle and diaphanous scarf, with a wooded mountain landscape behind.  The extremely loose handling of the paint, rich palette and the figure of the infant Jesus all recall Schiavone's more famous contemporary, Titian, whose style had a great impact on the artist, especially after 1550. 

1.  See F. Richardson, Andrea Schiavone, Oxford 1980, p. 170, no. 282.