ANTONELLO da Messina
(b. ca. 1430, Messina, d 1479, Messina)

Pietà

c. 1475
Oil on panel, 115 x 86 cm
Museo Correr, Venice

The only work by Antonello still in Venice, where he resided in 1475 and 1476, it was probably painted at the beginning of his stay in the city. The splendid background scene, one of the best preserved parts of this very badly damaged painting, with the apse of the church of San Francesco d'Assisi in Messina, is the artist's tribute to the city of his birth.