Coronation of the virgin, Venetian school 14th century

This noteworthy piece is attributable to the circle of Lorenzo Veneziano, representing the coronation of the Virgin. It is a late Gothic Venetian tempera on panel enriched with gold leaf, a technique common throughout Italo-Byzantine art and still in use in Venice at the time.
The artwork is composed of the Virgin Mary and Christ seated on a marble bench, surrounded by an intemporal radiant gold background, symbolic of the sacred celestial plane. The encapsulating brilliant surroundings are meant to integrate the virgin and the Christ into an idealized spiritual hierarchy, in line with the visual theology of the 14th century.
Christ is represented with golden hair and bears a crimson robe adorned with detailed embroidery around the neck. Delicately, he places a crown upon Mary’s head. The elongation of limbs such as the neck and fingers as seen in this work is characteristic of the Gothic style whereby spiritually is evoked through bodily slenderness. Both figures are drawn with soft features and almond shaped eyes deriving from the Byzantine influence.
Based on this panel’s pyramidal form it could likely have been part of a devotional polyptych, a dismembered altarpiece, or a compartment of a predella. The symmetrical structure and brilliant use of gold leaf accompanied by the lack of architectural depth place this panel in line with the Byzantine-Gothic aesthetic still popular in Venice at the time.
This piece is in line with the stylistic tradition of Lorenzo Veneziano (active between 1356 and 1372). Recognizable by the linear folds in the design of the draperies and the humanizing treatment of the faces. Lorenzo was influential in the transition of Venetian paintings from obdurate Eastern tradition to more Gothic narrative expressiveness and fluidity.