• Author: Fra Bartolomeo
• Date: 1516
• Collection: PAINTING
• Technique: Oil on panel
• Dimensions: 210x140 cm (with frame)
• Inventory: Inv. 1890 n. 1448

This panel, together with its twin depicting the Prophet Job, also preserved in the Gallery, belonged to an altarpiece created by Fra Bartolomeo for the chapel of the banker Salvatore Billi in the Basilica della Santissima Annunziata in Florence. This altar was in the centre of a monumental niche: in the centre, there was the Salvator Mundi (today in Florence, Galleria Palatina, dated 1516) while on the sides, there were the two Prophets, at an angle of slightly more than 90 degrees to the central element, creating the impression of a half-open triptych. Isaiah is pointing to Christ and holding a tablet on which a biblical passage referring to the Salvator Mundi is engraved. The twisted pose of the prophet recalls that of the Jeremiah frescoed by Raphael in the Basilica of Saint Augustine in Rome, where the friar-painter had stayed a couple of years earlier (1514).

The creation of the altarpiece for the Billi Chapel, which was to complement the decoration of the solemn architecture of the niche, and the complex execution of three paintings closely related in composition and iconography, was Fra Bartolomeo’s last and most ambitious work.