Assumption of Mary with Angels and Saints Giovanni Gualberto, Bernardo degli Uberti and Benedict, Archangel Michael (Vallombrosa Altarpiece, central compartment) – Galleria dell’Accademia – Florence

The Assumption was part of a complex altar machine, then dismembered at the beginning of the eighteenth century, commissioned in 1488 by Don Biagio Milanesi and Baldassarre di Antonio d’Angelo to Perugino for the church of the Badia di Vallombrosa, immersed in the Casentino forest outside Florence. In 1500 Perugino finished the work, originally including a Crucifixion, the Miracle of Fire, the Miracle of the Demoniac, a lost predella and the portraits of the two patrons.

The scene of the Assumptions shows in the upper part God the Creator, within a sphere of light, holding the Globe in the hand and surrounded by cherubim and angels; just below Him, the Virgin is ascending into heaven in a bright almond, surrounded by a concert of celestial figures playing musical instruments. In the lower part of the Altarpiece, four characters attend the scene: the Vallombrosan Cardinal Bernardo degli Uberti, San Giovanni Gualberto (founder of the Order), Saint Michael Archangel (whose model recalls the figure of Lucio Sicinio at the Nobile Collegio del Cambio), and Saint Benedict.

During the requisitions ordered by Napoleon, the painting was brought to France in 1810; it was later brought back to Italy and included in the Galleria dell’Accademia collection, where it’s still preserved.

The painting is preserved at the Galleria dell’Accademia, Florence.