How does this artwork elucidate its History?
The artwork was painted for the altar of the Guardini chapel on the left wall of the Chiesa di San Niccolò Oltrarno in Florence. It is not known whether the work was painted before or after the Brancacci Chapel (where Masolino worked from 1424 to 1425). The date of the painting is tied to the question of Masolino's capacity for using perspective—he might have developed the technique either on his own or with the help of his collaborator on the Brancacci Chapel, Masaccio.In 1567, the panel was transferred to another chapel, and in 1576 it was placed in the church's sacristy, when it was substituted by a more modern Annunciation painted by Alessandro Fei. It remained in the church until around the beginning of the 19th century—its disappearance from the church was only mentioned in editorial comments from the 1832–1838 edition of Giorgio Vasari's Le Vite and unpublished c. 1800 notes by Tommaso Puccini. The painting was then sold and exported from Florence, perhaps by Francis Douglas, 8th Earl of Wemyss, to Gosford House in Scotland. It passed on in inheritance until it was found in London in 1915 by the antiquarian Robert Langton Douglas, who in 1916 gave it to Henry Goldman of New York. On April 26, 1937, it was bought by the A.W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust of Pittsburgh, which then donated it to the National Gallery in Washington, D.C.
Giorgio Vasari Annunciation Masaccio Robert Langton Douglas Alessandro Fei Masolino Brancacci Chapel Chiesa di San Niccolò Oltrarno Gosford House Le Vite perspective A.W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust National Gallery Tommaso Puccini Francis Douglas, 8th Earl of Wemyss