The painting belonged to the chapel of Our Lady of Help of the Funchal Cathedral, where the former patron saint St. James the Greater was located. In 1939, the historian Luís Reis Santos attributed the painting to Jan Gossart.
On the occasion of the exhibition Painting of the 15th and 16th Centuries of the Island of Madeira that was held in 1955 at the National Museum of Ancient Art in Lisbon after the restoration of the paintings from Funchal, it was possible to read the inscription: ANNO DO. 1543.
The picture shows the Virgin in majesty, enthroned and crowned, with the Child and two of the Holy Apostles on each side, James and Andrew.
The Child displays in his right hand a fistful of cherries, symbolising the sweetness of Paradise that awaits the saved. In the background of the composition, at a distance, there are scenes describing the martyrdom of the Saints.
The painting reveals the essential of the design and typical composition of the work of Jan Gossart¹ in the final phase of his life. Thus, the date 1543 must correspond to the conclusion of the painting, finished by his followers after his death.
The representation of the Virgin no longer has the ethereal beauty of the Flemish images of the 1400s, but rather the human and spiritual features of an Italian Madonna, resulting from the conflict in the work of Gossart between the Flemish vision of his training and an accentuated Italianism. He was one of those who introduced the style to Flanders, giving rise to the generation of the Mannerists of Antwerp. The figures reveal a clear attention to the classical model, in which the face of Mary is stands out.
In the painting, the inequality in the pictorial treatment is notorious, which accentuates the idea that it was begun by the master, but finished by his followers.
Jan Gossart, called the Mabuse, was probably born in Maubeuge, in Hainault, around 1478 and was received as a master in the Antwerp guild in 1503. Between 1508 and 1509, he accompanied Filipe da Borgonha on a trip to Italy to draw works of Antiquity. He died in Antwerp around 1533.

¹ Arte Flamenga, Museu de Arte Sacra do Funchal, Luiza Clode e Fernando António Baptista Pereira, EDICARTE, 1997, p. 94.