| Title | Madonna and Child with Saint John |
| Artist | Giovan Pietro Rizzoli, known as Giampietrino |
| Date | 16th century, first half |
| Dimensions | 76 x 56 cm |
| Type | painting |
| Technique | painting on panel |
| Location | Museo Civico Amedeo Lia (La Spezia) |
The panel, once considered an autograph work by Leonardo da Vinci in a private Milanese collection, was purchased around 1830 by Count Jules de Champfeu. After passing through several collections, the work reached the English market in 1992 with an attribution to Giampietrino.
Its style, strongly influenced by Leonardo, clearly points to Giampietrino. However, the broader corpus may include works by several artists active within a productive workshop context.
In the painting, the religious character is almost understated compared with the secular elements. The Madonna, remarkable for her beauty, delicately supports the Child while Saint John turns toward him. The dark background highlights the Madonna's elegant dress and jewels. Yet it is a fruit in the background that draws our attention: a worm-eaten, decaying apple, in sharp contrast with the beauty of the young mother. The apple is a symbol of decay, a universal warning about the transience of prosperity and youth.
Giovan Pietro Rizzoli, sometimes Ricci or Rizzi, known as Giampietrino, was an Italian painter active in the first half of the 16th century, a pupil of Leonardo da Vinci and a representative of the Lombard school.
No documents about his life are known, and there are no signed works. For this reason, the label Giampietrino identifies a substantial group of examples with uneven quality but a shared stylistic foundation.
Influenced by Leonardo's painting, he delicately echoes its sfumato atmosphere while combining it with elements linked to Mantegna's early manner. His first certain work is dated 1521: a Madonna and Child with Saints Michael and Jerome, painted for the church of San Marino in Pavia, alongside clear references to the painting of Cesare da Sesto and to his classicism developed in a Roman context.
Among his main works are, in Milan, two half-length Magdalens and an unfinished Madonna and Child (Brera); a Nativity (church of San Sepolcro); the polyptych in Ospedaletto Lodigiano; and a Last Supper, a copy of Leonardo's painting, preserved at Magdalen College, Oxford.
- Dipinti. La Spezia Museo Civico Amedeo Lia. Federico Zeri and Andrea De Marchi. Silvana Editoriale. 1997. ISBN: 8882150771