8 FRA BARTOLOMMEO (Baccio della Porta) Italian, 1472­1517 The Rest on the Flight into Egypt with Saint John the Baptist, circa 1509 Oil on panel 129.5 x 106.6 cm (51 x 42 in.) 96.PB.15 Fra Bartolommeo painted this work in 1509, immediately after his return to Florence from Venice. The calm grandeur and inventive subject of The Rest on the Flight illustrate the artist's fresh response to the monumental Florentine High Renaissance style, initiated by Leonardo, Michelangelo, and Raphael. In this beautifully orchestrated dialogue of gesture and glance, the Holy Family, having escaped Bethlehem and King Herod's massacre of the innocents, take their ease beneath a date palm tree. Mary and Joseph look on as the infant John the Baptist greets the Christ Child, who grasps John's reed cross despite his mother's restraining hand. The Baptist's presence is a poignant reminder that the ultimate purpose of the Child's escape is his sacrifice on the cross. Fra Bartolommeo reinforces the pathos by including the pomegranate, a fruit that prefigures Christ's death, and the sheltering palm, whose fronds will pave the Savior's final entry into Jerusalem. The ruined arch alludes to the downfall of the pagan order and the rise of Christ's church, personified by Mary. Fra Bartolommeo captures the Florentine ideal of beauty in the Madonna's gracefully turning pose and in the even curves of her softly modeled face and neck. The painter's fascination with nature is suggested by his masterful handling of the diffuse golden light emanating from the mist­shrouded city of Bethlehem, the crisply detailed palm tree, and in the freely painted feathers of the rustling bird on the arch. DJ ITALIAN SCHOOL 23