Sections

The large contoured cross on the entrance walls is a masterpiece of thirteenth-century Italian painting. It is the work of the Master of the Franciscan Crucifixes, an Umbrian artist who was active in the Marches and Emilia, and whom some scholars have identified as Guido di Pietro – father of Oderisi da Gubbio. The painting is a link between Umbrian culture with the teachings of Giunta Pisano and the Emilian school with its more subdued dramatic tones and precious colours.

The other panels, many of which are on gold grounds, present an overview of painting in Faenza and Italy from the end of the thirteenth century to the beginning of the fifteenth. The array includes: the Master of Faenza; Giovanni da Rimini, follower of Giotto and founder of the “Rimini school”, who painted the early fourteenth-century Madonna and Child; the Sienese Niccolò di Segna; Catarino Veneziano; and Late Gothic painters such as Michele di Matteo and the Master of San Pier Damiano.

The pinnacle with the Prophet Baruch is from the since-lost marble polyptych, which Cardinal Bertrando del Poggetto commissioned from the sculptor Giovanni di Balduccio in 1332 for the papal chapel in the Rocca di Galliera, Bologna.