Taddeo di Bartolo's altarpiece at S. Francesco in Pisa: new discoveries and a reconstruction

The writer discusses Taddeo di Bartolo's altarpiece at S. Francesco in Pisa, Italy, on the occasion of the rediscovery of two long-lost panels from the work. This signed and dated Marian altarpiece of 1395, located in the sacristy chapel, is a key work by Di Bartolo, who reached artistic maturity in the years that he spent in Pisa in the 1390s as the most important foreign painter. The writer traces the early historiography of the altarpiece, enumerating many details of its original configuration and correcting some errors in the early written record. She also deals with technical aspects of the structure and touches on the iconography and formal concerns where they help explain the original form of the multipartite painting. She offers new identifications of several buttress figures, based partly on a hitherto unrecognized focus of devotion in the Pisan church, and establishes guidelines for imagining the lost upper register of the altarpiece.