With eyes downcast and hands clasped in prayer, the Virgin Mary gazes upon her son. He is fully recumbent and so fast asleep as to appear almost lifeless—a foreshadowing of the adult Christ’s death and entombment. Crisp lines articulate the composition, and deeply scored contours in the Virgin’s veil suggest Bartolomeo Vivarini laid in his design with a sharp implement, possibly tracing from a cartoon. The painter belonged to a long line of Venetian artisans, first recorded as glass blowers on the island of Murano. An inscription at lower right translates, “Painted by Bartolomeo Vivarini of Murano in 1481.”