The Virgin and Child (Ugolino)

The Virgin holds her son against a gold ground, her face long and grave beneath a sheer white veil, while the Child reaches up to grasp its edge. Ugolino di Nerio was the most faithful follower of Duccio, and the panel carries the master's Sienese manner forward almost intact - the melancholy tilt of the head, the gold-hemmed drapery, the foreknowledge of sorrow in the downcast eyes. It was once part of a polyptych, a large multi-panel altarpiece, since broken up and scattered; here it distills Sienese tenderness into a single quiet pairing.