Devotion, Gold, and the Virgin: Visualizing Mary in Three Fourteenth-Century Tuscan Panels in the National Gallery of Denmark

The essay is concerned with three Tuscan trecento paintings, which depict the Virgin with her Child against a gold background and are in the collection of the National Gallery of Denmark. All three works were once central parts of multi-paneled altarpieces. The essay highlights how Mary is represented, the visual traditions upon which these paintings draw, the possible significances of and the interplay between narrative elements and colors, especially gold, and how the images affected their viewers and prompted devotion. An exploration of these pictorial and devotional considerations offers new insights into the meanings and functions of the three paintings.