Madre della Consolazione

1490 · Private collection

religious

This icon represents a variant of the "Madre della Consolazione:" here, the Christ-child is holding not the scroll with the Greek quotation, but a golden orb, which is unusual in Byzantine icon-painting. The "invention" of this hitherto unknown Mother-of-God type is attributed to the Cretan painter Nikolaos Tzafoures. According to Cretan documents preserved in the Venetian state archives, Nikolaos Tzafoures (Nicolaus Zafuri) was first mentioned in 1487 in Candia (today's Herakleion) in Crete, where he lived and worked until about 1500.

About the Artist

Nikolaos Tsafouris

? – 1501

Greek icon painter who was active in Crete. He signed several icons, and his name appears in Venetian documents. Nikolaos Tzafouris was head of a workshop in Crete, then under Venetian rule and known as the Regno di Candia. He produced small devotional paintings, often signed, to be pedaled by the so called madonneri in Venice and he specialized in images of the Madonna and Child holding a small globe, thought to be imbued with healing properties. The artist combined popular Western imagery with the Byzantine iconography of his homeland.

View all works →