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This panel belonged to an altarpiece, now dismembered. According to the reconstruction accepted by many scholars, the altarpiece consisted of a Virgin and Child in the centre (Brooklyn Museum, New York), St Augustin (Lindenau-Museum, Altenburg) at the left, and probably St Nicholas (lost) at the right. The three predella panels are the Departure of St Augustin (Staatliche Museen, Berlin), the Entry of Christ to Jerusalem (Pinacoteca Stuard, Parma), and the Birth of St Nicholas (Kunstmuseum, Basel).
Pietro di Giovanni d'Ambrogio is a painter of unusually distinctive personality who invests both figures and space alike with emotional intensity. Possibly showing a journey undertaken by St Augustine, his mother St Monica waving from the shore, this well-preserved panel presents Pietro's original colour at its keenest.
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