The Holy Family with the Infant Saint John the Baptist (Il Silenzio) (oil on copper)

The Madonna, wearing a red robe and blue drapery is seated in an interior with the Child lying asleep on her lap. She holds a book in her left hand open at Psalm 85.11 and lifts a transparent veil from the Child's body, a reference to the revelation of Truth. St John, wrapped in an animal skin, is on the left, behind the bench and Joseph on the right. Christ is slumped across his mother's lap in a pose that prefigures the Lamenation or Pietà when his dead body is placed there. A famous presentation red chalk drawing by Michelangelo of around 1538-40 was the design that was basis for painted versions by his followers. It was known as Madonna del Silenzio (Il Silenzio) or 'Silentium' (Silence) because of the gesture of St John on the left putting his left index finger to his lips, whilst the Holy Family contemplate the sleeping Christ Child. Another of many versions, attributed to Venusti, is in the National Galley and one, without a landscape background and with putto-angels pulling aside drapery on both sides at the top is by Lavinia Fontana in the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool and another, with an extensive landscape, attributed to Bacchiacca, is in the Ashmolean, Oxford. It is one of innumerable (over twenty) versions of the composition produced by Venusti and his studio, which derives from Michelangelo's drawing in the Duke of Portland's Collection, Welbeck Abbey. Ickworth, Suffolk (Accredited Museum)