{ "data": { "id": 144966, "accession_number": "1970.160", "share_license_status": "CC0", "tombstone": "Virgin and Child with the Young Saint John the Baptist, c. 1490. Sandro Botticelli (Italian, 1444/45\u20131510), and Workshop. Tempera and oil on wood; framed: 115 x 12.5 cm (45 1/4 x 4 15/16 in.); diameter: 68 cm (26 3/4 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund, 1970.160", "current_location": "117A Italian Renaissance", "title": "Virgin and Child with the Young Saint John the Baptist", "creation_date": "c. 1490", "creation_date_earliest": 1485, "creation_date_latest": 1495, "artists_tags": [ "gender unknown", "male" ], "culture": [ "Italy" ], "technique": "tempera and oil on wood", "support_materials": [], "department": "Medieval Art", "collection": "MED - Renaissance", "type": "Painting", "measurements": "Framed: 115 x 12.5 cm (45 1/4 x 4 15/16 in.); Diameter: 68 cm (26 3/4 in.)", "dimensions": { "framed": { "height": 1.15, "height_inch": 45, "height_inch_fraction": 0.25, "depth": 0.125, "depth_inch": 4, "depth_inch_fraction": 0.9375 }, "diameter": { "width": 0.68, "width_inch": 26, "width_inch_fraction": 0.75 } }, "state_of_the_work": null, "edition_of_the_work": null, "copyright": null, "inscriptions": [], "exhibitions": { "current": [ { "id": 301391, "title": "Year in Review: 1970", "description": "Year in Review: 1970. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 10-March 7, 1971).", "opening_date": "1971-02-10T05:00:00" }, { "id": 301412, "title": "Florence and the Arts: Five Centuries of Patronage", "description": "Florence and the Arts: Five Centuries of Patronage. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (July 13-September 19, 1971).", "opening_date": "1971-07-13T04:00:00" }, { "id": 675363, "title": "Filippino Lippi and Rome", "description": "Filippino Lippi and Rome. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 26, 2025-February 22, 2026).", "opening_date": "2025-11-26T05:00:00" } ], "legacy": [ { "description": "Possibly Expositions du Palais Bourbon, Paris, 1880s", "opening_date": null }, { "description": "Cambridge, Mass., Fogg Art Museum, 1915: \"Loan Exhibition of Italian Paintings.\"", "opening_date": "1915-01-01T00:00:00" } ] }, "provenance": [ { "description": "Robert Hoe III [1839-1909], New York, NY, after his death, held in trust by his estate1", "citations": [], "footnotes": [ "
1 Hoe was a founder and the first president of The Grolier Club in New York City.  The circumstances of Hoe\u2019s acquisition of the painting are unknown; The Grolier Club records include copies of Hoe sale catalogues and newspaper articles about his collection, but nothing detailing his acquisitions.  The earlier provenance of this painting is unknown, and is complicated by the fact that it has been confused with the provenances of several other paintings.  There are three erroneous provenances that have been proposed for the Cleveland picture, as well as an avenue of research being pursued that may reveal the painting\u2019s actual past provenance.  1) There is a suggestion in the CMA curatorial file that the painting was in the \u201cLenclanche\u201d [sic] collection in 1890, as per Mandel\u2019s Botticelli catalogue (p. 100).  This is incorrect:  Mandel, in fact, notes that a different tondo depicting Madonna and Child with the Young St. John was in the Leclanch\u00e9 collection until c. 1890, and was at the time in the Lanckoronski collection, Vienna.  2) It has been suggested by several sources that the CMA painting was possibly in the Rozi\u00e8re collection and appeared in an exhibition at the Palais du Bourbon in the 1880s.  Research revealed that the exhibition in question is in fact the Exposition du Palais Bourbon au profit des Alsaciens-Lorrains, held at the Palais Bourbon in 1874.  The exhibition contains four paintings of related subject matter attributed to Botticelli, none of which has Rozi\u00e8re listed as the owner or matches the dimensions of the Cleveland picture.  Although Plunkett (Sandro Botticelli, 1900), Gebhart (Sandro Botticelli, 1907) Ulmann (Sandro Botticelli, 1893), and Horne (Alessandro Filipepi, commonly called Sandro Botticelli, painter of Florence, 1908) all include Rozi\u00e8re in the provenance, to date no documentary evidence confirming Rozi\u00e8re\u2019s ownership or his lending it to the Bourbon exhibition has been found.  3) An undated letter, most likely written by someone at Ehrich Galleries, located in the National Gallery Archives was thought, since Ronald Lightbown\u2019s summary of the text was published in his Botticelli catalogue raisonn\u00e9 in 1978, to describe the Cleveland picture: \u201cThis picture comes from the collection of Cardinal Facchinetti, in Gubbio, Umbria; that Cardinal lived in the seventeenth century or a little later\u2026I purchased the picture myself some twenty years ago in Rimini, from the noble Facchinetti, a Judge, a descendant of the Cardinal\u2026I can repeat to you now that that picture was attributed to Filippino Lippi in the old catalogues of the family; and when I once took it out of the frame I found a small ticket on the panel\u2026.bearing the indication, Ridolfo Ghirlandajo; this ticket, written undoubtedly a very long time ago, ought to be there still.  Since I bought the picture the many friend-artists and critics who examined it gave as usual different opinions; the names of Lippi, Mainardi, and Botticini have been made\u2026[art historian Giacomo] de Nicola\u2026has come to the conclusion that it may be Botticini\u2019s.\u201d  It is unclear why this letter was initially thought to concern the Cleveland picture, but it may be because of the shared Ehrich Galleries connection. However, extensive research revealed that the Ehrich Galleries letter in fact referred to Francesco Botticini\u2019s Assumption of the Virgin, formerly in the Facchinetti collection and attributed to Botticini by Giacomo de Nicola (Old Masters form the Ehrich Galleries, American Art Galleries, Nov. 3, 1927, no. 68).  This painting was later in the collection of William Randolph Hearst (Art Objects & Furnishings from the William Randolph Hearst Collection, 1941, p. 14, no. 52-37). 4) A somewhat illegible stamp with a coat of arms and some text was discovered on the back of the Cleveland picture.  While research into its implications for the painting\u2019s provenance continues, at this point it appears clear that the painting was located in a Torino collection at some point.  The coat of arms appears to display the crest of the House of Savoy, but several Torino archives contacted did not recognize this particular stamp.
" ], "date": "Until 1909", "sortorder": 1 }, { "description": "(Hoe sale, American Art Association, New York, Feb. 15, 1911, to Arthur Hoe)", "citations": [], "footnotes": [], "date": "1911", "sortorder": 2 }, { "description": "Arthur I. Hoe [1880-1956], Bedford Hills, NY 1", "citations": [], "footnotes": [ "
1 There are two possible ways this painting made its way into the possession of Arthur Hoe, Robert's son, following his father's estate sale.  CMA files note, \u201cas sold to A. Haviland but [bought] in,\u201d indicating that while some copies note that Haviland purchased the painting, in fact the painting failed to meet its reserve price and was bought in and eventually returned to Arthur.  However, annotated copies of the sale catalogue indicate the buyer was \u201cA.  Haviland.\u201d  It is possible that  Arthur Hoe bought his father's painting back through Haviland, who may have acted as his agent.  Furthermore, a letter from Fogg Museum director Edward W. Forbes to Harvard professor of art history Arthur Pope (April 9, 1914) notes that Arthur \"bought the picture back at his father's sale.\"  Hoe would later lend the CMA picture to the Fogg from November 1914 to March 1916, when it was likely included in an exhibition of Italian primitive paintings (no catalogue).  On March 2, 1916 Hoe informed Forbes that there were several parties interested in purchasing the Botticelli and that he would like to come to Cambridge to retrieve it, much to the dismay of Forbes, who had hoped Hoe would give the painting to the Fogg.
" ], "date": "1911-at least 1916", "sortorder": 3 }, { "description": "(Ehrich Galleries, New York) 1", "citations": [], "footnotes": [ "
It is unclear when and from whom Ehrich Galleries acquired this painting, as various sources provide differing information.  The provenances of paintings in other museum collections include purchases by Ehrich Galleries from Baron Lazzaroni, leading some to suggest that the CMA painting, too, followed this path; however, Mandel and Levey's 1967 Botticelli catalogue raisonn\u00e9 notes that Lazzaroni was the most recent owner, and that Ehrich Galleries acquired it c. 1925. However, Yashiro's 1925 Botticelli catalogue raisonn\u00e9 situates the painting with Lazzaroni, so clearly, it must have left the possession of Ehrich Galleries by some point that year.  In his catalogue of 1927, Venturi notes that the painting \"has come from America and more particularly from the Ehrich Collection,\" also suggesting that it was with Ehrich Galleries prior to Lazzaroni who resided in Europe.  Furthermore, while no definite connection between Hoe and Ehrich Galleries has been established, it is worth noting that Ehrich Galleries also lent several paintings to the Fogg c. 1915, and so it is possible that Hoe was familiar with the gallery and later sold his his painting to them.  A 1918 exhibition at the Ehrich Galleries includes a \"Madonna, Child, and Saint John,\" attributed to the Botticelli School which may or may not be the Cleveland picture.

" ], "date": "Before 1925", "sortorder": 4 }, { "description": "Baron Michele Lazzaroni [1863-1934], Rome 1", "citations": [], "footnotes": [ "
1 Lazzaroni, a collector and restorer, certainly owned the Botticelli by 1925, when Yashiro's catalogue raisonn\u00e9 situates the painting in his collection.  Lazzaroni died in 1934, although sales of his collection continued to take place through the 1950s, suggesting that works he had owned remained in the possession of family members.  A May 6, 1953 Drouot sale of works from the Lazzaroni collection contains \u201cLa Vierge, l\u2019Enfant et Saint Jean dans un paysage\u201d (no. 26) attributed to the Florentine school; there is no buyer information or reproduction.  It is a tondo with a diameter of 73 cm; the CMA tondo is 75/76 cm.  The Mus\u00e9e Avignon confirmed that their version (75 cm), formerly in the Mus\u00e9e Fabre in Montpellier is closer, was never with Lazzaroni, and so it is possible that the tondo in the Lazzaroni sale may be the CMA picture.  

" ], "date": "by 1925", "sortorder": 5 }, { "description": "(Guglielmo Canessa, Milan, Italy) 1", "citations": [], "footnotes": [ "
1 In a letter to art dealer Guglielmo Canessa from 1959 CMA director Sherman Lee writes that he will be visiting Milan and if the painting was \u201cin [Canessa\u2019s] hands,\u201d he would like to see it.  It is not clear whether Lee actually saw the painting at this time, or to whom Canessa ultimately sold it.
" ], "date": "By 1959", "sortorder": 6 }, { "description": "Private collection, Milan 1", "citations": [], "footnotes": [ "
1 According to the invoice from Iolanda d\u2019Antoni, the painting was in a private Milanese collection before she acquired it.  Although it is unclear whether Canessa was an owner or dealer in connection with the painting, it is possible that Canessa is the private collector in question. 
" ], "date": "Before 1970", "sortorder": 7 }, { "description": "(Iolanda d'Antoni, Lugano, Switzerland, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)", "citations": [], "footnotes": null, "date": "Until 1970", "sortorder": 8 }, { "description": "The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH", "citations": [], "footnotes": null, "date": "1970-", "sortorder": 9 } ], "find_spot": null, "related_works": [], "former_accession_numbers": [], "did_you_know": "Saint John the Baptist, depicted here as a youth, and the Virgin were both patron saints of Florence.", "early_education_description": null, "artlens_description": null, "description": "The perfectly round form, called a tondo, became popular during the 1440s, especially in Florence. Made for domestic settings instead of churches, the circular format challenged the artist to create a harmonious, balanced composition within this more difficult shape. The attribution has been a matter of debate. Botticelli often collaborated with students, including Filippino Lippi, who would himself become a significant painter. Few specialists have doubted that Botticelli executed the central passages: the delicate modeling of the faces, the graceful poses, the figures\u2019 profound interiority, and the diaphanous veil are the artist\u2019s hallmarks. However, someone else in Botticelli\u2019s studio probably painted Mary\u2019s blue garment, also the most heavily restored part of the painting.", "external_resources": { "wikidata": [ "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q7934011" ], "internet_archive": [ "https://archive.org/details/clevelandart-1970.160-virgin-and-child-wit" ] }, "citations": [ { "citation": "Yashiro, Yukio. Sandro Botticelli. London: The Medici Society, 1925.", "page_number": "247", "url": null }, { "citation": "Bettini, Sergio. Botticelli. Bergamo: Istituto Italiano d'Arti Grafiche, 1947.", "page_number": "34", "url": null }, { "citation": "Levey, Michael, and Gabriele Mandel. The Complete Paintings of Botticelli. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1967.", "page_number": "100", "url": null }, { "citation": "Venturi, Adolfo. Botticelli. London: A. Zwemmer, 1927.", "page_number": "116", "url": null }, { "citation": "American Art Association. Catalogue of the Valuable Art Property Collected by the Late Robert Hoe of New York. Feb. 15, 1911.", "page_number": null, "url": "" }, { "citation": "Horne, Herbert P. Alessandro Filipepi commonly called Sandro Botticelli: Painter of Florence. London: George Bell & Sons, 1980.", "page_number": "123\u20134", "url": null }, { "citation": "Lightbown, Ronald. Sandro Botticelli: Complete Catalogue. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978.", "page_number": "124", "url": null }, { "citation": "Edgell, G. H. \u201cThe Loan Exhibition of Italian Paintings in the Fogg Mueum, Cambridge.\u201d Art and Archaeology: An Illustrated Magazine 2, Issue 1 (July, 1915\u2013December, 1915): 11\u201322.", "page_number": "", "url": "https://archive.org/details/sim_art-and-archaeology_1915-07_2_1/page/10/mode/2up" }, { "citation": "Litt, Steven. \"Cleveland museum's painting on this year's Christmas stamp.\" The Plain Dealer (Cleveland), October 9, 2008.", "page_number": "", "url": "" }, { "citation": "van Marle, Raimond. The Development of the Italian Schools of Paintings XIII. The Hague: Nijhoff, 1931.", "page_number": "171", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Piero Corsini, Inc. Important Old Master Paintings and Discoveries of the Past Year. New York: Corsini, 1986.", "page_number": "13", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Olson, Roberta J. M. The Florentine Tondo. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000.", "page_number": "", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Chong, Alan. European & American Painting in The Cleveland Museum of Art: A Summary Catalogue. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1993.", "page_number": "18", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Wootten, Dick. \"Art Museum solves case of the Botched Botticelli.\" The Cleveland Press (Cleveland), February 20, 1971.", "page_number": "20\u201321", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Mus\u00e9e Fabre. Catalogue des Peintures et Sculptures Expos\u00e9es dans les Galeries du Mus\u00e9e Fabre de la Ville de Montpellier. Montpellier: Serre et Roume\u0301gous, 1904.", "page_number": "188", "url": "https://archive.org/details/cataloguedespein00muse/mode/2up" }, { "citation": "The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1991. Reproduced: p. 71.", "page_number": "", "url": "https://archive.org/details/CMAHandbook1991/mode/2up" }, { "citation": "Gamba, Carlo. Botticelli. Milan: Ulrico Hoepli, 1936.", "page_number": "p. 148, pl. 101", "url": "" }, { "citation": "The Metropolitan Museum of Art.The Art Quarterly 34, Summer (1971): cover, 249.", "page_number": "", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Bo, Carlo and Gabriele Mandel. L'opera completa del Botticelli. Milan: Rizzoli Editore: 1967.", "page_number": "100\u20131", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Mesnil, Jacques. Botticelli. Paris: Albin Michel, 1938.", "page_number": "p. 163, pl. LXXXIX", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Salvini, Roberto. Tutta la Pittura del Botticelli, Vol. 2. Milan: Rizzoli, 1958.", "page_number": "p. 40, pl. 6", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Lee, Sherman et al. The Cleveland Museum of Art. Hannover: Knorr & Hirth Verlag GMBH, 1976.", "page_number": "35", "url": "" }, { "citation": "Tigram. \u201cC'\u00e8 una Crisi dell'Arte in Italia? La Confederazione Naz. Degli Amici dell'Arte. Intervista col Prof. Adolfo Venturi.\u201d Vita Artistica 1, No. 1 (1926): 2\u20133.", "page_number": "", "url": "https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nyp.33433102508532&seq=9" }, { "citation": "Lee, Sherman E. \u201cThe Year in Review for 1970.\u201d The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 58, 2 (February, 1971): 23\u20135.", "page_number": "Mentioned: p. 25; Reproduced: Cover", "url": "http://www.jstor.org/stable/25152361" }, { "citation": "Cleveland Museum of Art. Catalogue of Paintings. Pt. 1. European Paintings before 1500. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1974.", "page_number": "Reproduced: fig. 19, p. 50 - 53; colorplate XI", "url": "" }, { "citation": "The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978.", "page_number": "Reproduced: p. 92", "url": "https://archive.org/details/CMAHandbook1978/page/n112" }, { "citation": "Dwyer Modestini, Dianne, and Mario Modestini. Masterpieces: Based on a Manuscript by Mario Modestini. Fiesole (Firenze) : Cadmo, 2018.", "page_number": "Mentioned: p 363-366; Reproduced: p. 364-365 and plates XXII, XXIII", "url": "https://www.kressconservation.org/Resources/Masterpieces-Memoir/Masterpieces" }, { "citation": "Noelle, Alexander J., and Cleveland Museum of Art. Filippino Lippi and Rome. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2025.", "page_number": "Mentioned and reproduced: p. 94-95, no. 2", "url": "" } ], "url": "https://clevelandart.org/art/1970.160", "images": { "annotation": null, "web": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_web.jpg", "width": "900", "height": "899", "filesize": "339881", "filename": "1970.160_web.jpg" }, "print": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_print.jpg", "width": "3400", "height": "3396", "filesize": "3616125", "filename": "1970.160_print.jpg" }, "full": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_full.tif", "width": "9942", "height": "9931", "filesize": "296234408", "filename": "1970.160_full.tif" } }, "alternate_images": [ { "web": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_alt0_web.jpg", "width": "891", "height": "900", "filesize": "375334" }, "print": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_alt0_print.jpg", "width": "3366", "height": "3400", "filesize": "4515175" }, "full": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_alt0_full.tif", "width": "9805", "height": "9904", "filesize": "291357748" }, "date_created": "2023-05-01T11:23:11", "annotation": "" }, { "web": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_alt1_web.jpg", "width": "883", "height": "900", "filesize": "384174" }, "print": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_alt1_print.jpg", "width": "3337", "height": "3400", "filesize": "3900722" }, "full": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_alt1_full.tif", "width": "9429", "height": "9607", "filesize": "271786676" }, "date_created": "2023-05-01T09:58:28", "annotation": "" }, { "web": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_alt2_web.jpg", "width": "915", "height": "893", "filesize": "445784" }, "print": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_alt2_print.jpg", "width": "3400", "height": "3317", "filesize": "4810788" }, "full": { "url": "https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.160/1970.160_alt2_full.tif", "width": "4198", "height": "4096", "filesize": "51618584" }, "date_created": "2006-08-23T15:51:41", "annotation": "" } ], "creditline": "Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund", "image_credit": null, "sketchfab_id": null, "sketchfab_url": null, "gallery_donor_text": null, "athena_id": 144966, "creators": [ { "id": 2053, "description": "Sandro Botticelli (Italian, 1444/45\u20131510)", "extent": null, "qualifier": null, "role": "artist", "biography": null, "name_in_original_language": null, "birth_year": "1444", "death_year": "1510", "use_in_caption": true, "include_extent": false, "weight": 1 }, { "id": 34768, "description": "Workshop", "extent": null, "qualifier": "and", "role": "artist", "biography": null, "name_in_original_language": null, "use_in_caption": true, "include_extent": false, "weight": 2 } ], "legal_status": "accessioned", "accession_date": "1970-12-18T00:00:00", "sortable_date": 1485, "date_added_to_oa": null, "date_text": "c. 1490", "collapse_artists": false, "on_loan": false, "recently_acquired": false, "record_type": "object", "conservation_statement": null, "has_conservation_images": false, "cover_accession_number": null, "is_nazi_era_provenance": true, "impression": null, "alternate_titles": [], "is_highlight": false, "updated_at": "2026-08-21 12:43:17.993000" } }