Sano di Pietro (Ansano di Pietro di Mencio)
Saint Anthony the Abbot in the Wildernessca. 1440
Sano di Pietro (Ansano di Pietro di Mencio) painted this in about 1440, aged about 30. It is now at The Met in New York. More about this work
About this work
Sano di Pietro (Ansano di Pietro di Mencio) painted this in about 1440, aged about 30. It is now at The Met in New York.
How it was made
- Gold ground
- Gold leaf laid over a red clay and burnished to a mirror shine, often tooled with punches so it flickers in candlelight. Behind sacred figures it stands for heavenly light.
- Tempera
- Pigment bound with egg yolk. It dries in minutes and can’t be blended wet, so painters built up form with fine, hatched strokes. It was Europe’s main panel technique before oil.
Sano di Pietro (Ansano di Pietro di Mencio)
Italian, 1405–1481 · Born and died in Siena.
Rights and the museum’s record
Public domain. The Met has dedicated this image to the public domain under CC0, so anyone may copy, adapt and use it, for any purpose, without asking. Our prints and files are reproductions made from the museum’s image; the museum doesn’t endorse them.
- Object number
- 1975.1.27
- Credit
- Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
- Type
- Paintings
- Department
- Robert Lehman Collection
- Licence
- CC0 1.0 Universal
- Museum record
- See it on the museum’s site
