Two Venetian Ladies was verified by an in depth technical analysis, comparing the two fragmentary panels. Another panel the same size as these two combined would have been on the left; probably the two were hinged together to make a diptych, or a folding door or shutter. The Getty panel has an illusionistic letter rack painted on the back of the panel, which was presumably matched on this panel. This appears to be the earliest small-scale trompe-l'œil painting since antiquity. Two Venetian Ladies Two Venetian Ladies is a painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Vittore Carpaccio. The painting, believed to be a quarter
Maestà The most famous example of the "Maestà" is the "Maestà with Twenty Angels and Nineteen Saints", an altarpiece comprising many individual paintings commissioned by the city of Siena in 1308 from the artist Duccio di Buoninsegna. The painting was installed in the city's cathedral on June 9, 1311. Although it took a generation for its effect truly to be felt, Duccio's "Maestà" set Italian painting on a course leading away from the hieratic representations of Byzantine art towards more direct presentations of reality. Creating this altarpiece assembled from many wood panels bonded together before painting was an arduous undertaking. The