The shining golden line running along the hem of the garment, which follows and doubles the silhouette of the Virgin turning to the angel, is not winding; apart from minor interruptions and fresh beginnings, it gives a practically straight line. This quality of the latter is enhanced by the significant role allotted in the picture to objects of truly straight geometrical contours, as the praying-desk and the stone parapet. Obviously the painter was getting over his preference for the swirling turmoil of Late-Gothic lines and approaching the reassuring calm of the Renaissance.
|