Solario (Italian, Milan, 1465 - Milan, 1524) worked in Milan after 1493, and in 1507 was invited to France, where he decorated a chapel at Château Gaillon for Cardinal Georges d'Amboise, Archbishop of Rouen. Between his return from France in 1510 and his death fourteen years later, he painted a number of variants on the present composition, of which this is one of the most notable. The descriptive naturalism of the picture is indebted to Netherlandish painting. Rather than recreate a narrative of Saint John's execution, Solario paints a closeup contrasting the girlish beauty of Salome with the decapitated head of her victim.
[Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York - Oil on wood, 57.2 x 47 cm]