The Death of Adam by Piero della Francesca

Contemporaries called Piero della Francesca “the monarch of painting.” He himself, in turn, could very well join the words of mathematician Luke Pacioli that “the queen and mother of art is a proportion”. By combining in their art a strict proportionality of forms, a perfect perspective with a subtle and harmonious color, Piero della Francesca pointed the way to the masters of the High Renaissance. Best of all, his light and austere gift appeared in the cycle of frescoes “Cross of Faith”.

These murals still astonish the visitors of the church of San Francesco in Arezzo, despite the fact that time mercilessly destroyed whole pieces of murals. A distinctive feature of the painter’s style of religious works was his “epic calm”, born of humility before the grandeur of the stories that his brush carried to the canvas, board or on the freshly stucco wall of the cathedral.