# Polyptych of St Augustine: St Augustine [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [PIERO della FRANCESCA]() - Date: 1451-1500 - Technique: Tempera on panel, 132 x 57 cm ## Commentary PIERO DELLA FRANCESCA \(b. 1416, Borgo San Sepolcro, d. 1492, Borgo San Sepolcro\) Polyptych of St Augustine: St Augustine c. 1465 Tempera on panel, 132 x 57 cm Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga, Lisbon In 1454 Piero agreed to paint a polyptych for the Augustinians of Borgo San Sepolcro; the painting was to be finished within eight years and was intended for their monastery. As usual, the work was not completed until much later. The polyptych later dismembered and the panels were scattered. It was only in the twentieth century that scholars succeeded in reconstructing this work. Among the parts of the polyptych that have unfortunately not survived there is also the central panel which represented the Virgin Enthroned. St Augustine was one of the four side panels depicting four saints \(St Augustine and St Michael at the left side and St John the Evangelist and St Nicholas of Tolentino at the right\). St Augustine, portrayed with a mitre and a splendid bishop's cope is one of the high points of Piero's painting, for here he achieves perfect harmony between the imposing solidity of his three-dimensional forms and his miniaturistic attention to detail. Since the art of Gentile da Fabriano, no Italian painter had succeded in giving such a detailed reproduction of a saint's vestments. Piero paints every single scene depicted on this precious cope as though he were painting a small predella panel, using, for the soft decorations of the fabric, a "dot" technique worthy of a miniature by Fouquet. And yet, it is the monumental values that prevail in the figure of this austere saint. ## Related artworks - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam \(detail\)]() - [1. Death of Adam]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()