Biography

Italian painter. He is named after the Virgin and Child Enthroned with Saints (Pinacoteca Comunale, Città di Castello), which may derive from a lost composition by Duccio di Buoninsegna. The painting is the earliest work of a corpus that also includes a dismembered polyptych of the Virgin and Child (Museo dell'Opera del Duomo, Siena) and SS Augustine, Paul, Peter and Anthony Abbot (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Siena); a polyptych of the Virgin and Child with SS Francis, John the Evangelist, Stephen and Chiara (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Siena); and a third altarpiece composed of a Virgin and Child (Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen), St Peter and St John the Baptist (Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven), as well as a St Francis (private collection). A Virgin and Child in Detroit (Institute of Art, Detroit) is a closely related shop work.

Although inclined to borrow heavily from Duccio and perhaps also from Segna di Bonaventura and Ugolino di Nerio, the Master had a distinctive style rooted in late 13th-century Sienese painting, and his works continued to reflect these origins well into the second decade of the 14th century. He was an interesting colourist, with a preference for subtle variations and pale hues, but his work had little impact on a younger generation in Siena.