Annunciation to the Shepherds

As the Gospel of Luke tells it, shepherds keeping watch by night were startled by an angel announcing Christ's birth (Luke 2:8-14). On a dark hillside Taddeo Gaddi shows the angel bursting from a cloud of golden light while a dazzled shepherd twists onto his back, flinging up a hand to shield his eyes, his flock and dog stirring below. Gaddi was Giotto's closest pupil, and here he carries his master's solid naturalism into new ground: this is one of the first true night scenes in Western art, the supernatural radiance carving figures and rocks out of the dark. Frescoed in the Baroncelli Chapel of Santa Croce, Florence.