Tátrai Vilmos szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei 90-91.(Budapest, 1999)

SCHMIDT, VICTOR M.: A Duccesque Fragment of the Coronation of the Virgin

a part of Duccio's famous Maestà painted for the main altar of Siena Cathedral.

4 The attribution to Duccio was accepted by Giovanna Ragionieri and Cecilia Jannella, who included the fragment in their short monographs of the artist.

5 Currently the museum uses the label «Ascribed to Duccio».

6 Conti's suggestion that the fragment belonged to the Maestà has, so far as I know, never been put to the test. Description The painting is a fragment of the Coronation of the Virgin. What remain are a bust of the Virgin and the hands of Christ holding her crown. The Virgin inclines her head, brings her left hand to her breast in a sign of humility and submission; she extends her other hand towards Christ to intercede with him on behalf of the painting's patrons, or mankind in general. The fragment makes a rich impression because of the many carefully executed decorative details. The patterns of the Virgin's dress and the cloth behind her are very eleborate. Her sleeves and those of Christ, as well as His garment, show the remains of golden striations, a feature that occurs e.g. in the Siena Maestà, where both Christ and the Virgin are thus represented in the post-Resurrection scenes on the rear side. The Virgin's crown looks like a beautiful piece of goldsmith work and the incised decorative border at the top of the panel and the floral motif in the Virgin's halo are also elaborate. The painting needs cleaning but this should not obscure its outstanding quality. The few scholars who highlighted the painting's quality were also the ones to propose an elevated attribution, either to Duccio and his workshop (Weigelt, Conti) or the young Segna (Coor). Attribution Before dealing with the reconstruction of the fragment, it would be useful to emphasize that there are good reasons for associating the fragment with the Maestà on the basis of style and ornament. The large central panel of the Maestà, with the Virgin and Child enthroned amidst a host of angels and saints, shows, especially in the heads, a fair range of diversity, albeit within the matrix of Duccio's unmistakable style (fig. 13). The fragment in Budapest comfortably falls within these parameters, as comparisons between the head of the Virgin and St Catherine on the far left (fig. 14) and St Agnes on the far right of the Maestà demonstrate. As to decorative details, Brigitte Kiesse has already shown that the pattern of the cloth of honor behind the Virgin is a virtual repetition of that of St Catherine's mantle.

7 The pattern of the Virgin's mantle in the frag4 Conti, A., review of: John White, Tuscan art and the Medieval workshop (London, 1979), in Prospettiva 1980, no. 23,98-101, esp. 100. 5 Ragionieri, op. cit. (Note 3) 134-135, no. 41; Jannella, C,Duccio diBuoninsegna, Antella 1991, 73. 6 Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest. Old Masters' Gallery. A summary catalogue of Italian, French, Spanish and Greek paintings, London - Budapest 1991, 35. 7 Kiesse, B., Seidenstoffe in der italienischen Malereides 14. Jahrhunderts, Bern 1967, 178, cat. 27a.