It is difficult to arrange Pintoricchio's pictures into distinct groups. He wandered backwards and forwards between Rome and Umbria for so many years, and his art, during the whole time, though showing variations, never undergoes any radical change or development. He arrived early at a point which satisfied his employers, and there he remained. He did not attempt to try experiments, or to unravel new problems. He was almost always engrossed by great undertakings, and had little time to think of anything beyond getting them creditably executed in a given time.
"La préoccupation d'être original n'empêchait pas de dormir, encore moins de travailler, les artistes d'alors. Leur personalité ne s'élaborait que sur le tard, quand ils réussissent sans le chercher beaucoup à le faire éclore."[32]
This constant employment on fresco accounts for the small number of panel paintings he has left, nor do we hear of more than one or two, other than those which have come down to us. I have already noticed the "St. Christopher" and the "Madonna" in the Gallery at Valencia. His finest work in _tempera_ is the great polyptych or ancona, painted in 1498 for the monks of Santa Maria dei Fossi, and which is an extraordinarily dainty piece of work. The heavily-gilt framework is divided into compartments. In the central one the Madonna is enthroned, the Child sits upon a little cushion on her knee, half-draped in a striped and brocaded mantle. With one hand He offers the mystic pomegranate to His mother, with the other grasps a jewelled cross, held by the little St. John Baptist, who, with his cloak clasped upon the breast, sandals on his feet, his eyes uplifted in devotion, strides forward, with the air of one starting on a pilgrimage. This attractive little figure is borrowed from the Bernardino Mariotto, with whom Pintoricchio was so often confused. The Virgin's eyes are cast down, and both her face and that of the Child are rather expressionless.
The upper part of the framework is filled by a Pietà, which nearly equals the middle panel in size and importance. The half-length of the dead Christ is draped with a striped cloth, above the open tomb. It is reminiscent of Perugino's beautiful Pietà in the same Gallery. The hands have the backs turned outwards, displaying the palms instead of the backs, as the northern painters usually represent them. The arms are supported by angels, who are adapted from the over-door by Fiorenzo in the Sala del Censo. The pathetic figure of the Saviour is the most satisfactory rendering of the nude that Pintoricchio produced. The muscles are carefully modelled, the flesh is firmly painted, and the touch of the angels convincing, the group is full of repose, sad dignity, and refinement. The Angel and Virgin of the "Annunciation" on either side are a reduced _replica_ of those in the Borgia Apartments and at Spello. Though painted in _tempera_, this work is extremely full and vivid in colour, almost resembling oils, and is executed throughout with minute delicacy.