PAOLO DI GIOVANNI FEI

In this altarpiece that originally may have hung in a Franciscan chapel, the Christ child’s gesture invites us to draw near, into the realm of angels. Kneeling in the foreground are St. Francis of Assisi on the left—identifiable by his humble burlap robe and the stigmata on his hands resembling the wounds of the crucified Christ—and St. Louis of Toulouse on the right, who became a Franciscan monk after renouncing his right to the French throne, symbolized by the cast-off crown at his feet.