We contemplate a beautiful illustration used in the Compendium to introduce the section on the Ten Commandments, a fresco by Guido di Pietro (Fra Angelico).
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/23/Fra_Angelico_-_Die_Be...
In his Lives of the Artists, published in 1550, Giorgio Vasari tells us that ‘to portray holy and spiritual things, a man must have a holy and pious mind’. No one in the history of art satisfies that requirement more fully than Guido di Pietro, known in the religious life as Fra Giovanni da Fiesole, but better known to us as Fra Angelico. A man of outstanding holiness, he only ever began painting after long periods spent in prayer, and it is said that he could never paint a crucifixion without weeping. He was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1984.
The fresco we are studying was made by Fra Angelico between 1440 and 1450, as part of the decoration of the Monastery of St Marco in Florence. It is to be found in the north wing in cell 32.
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