Madonna with the Infant Christ and John the Baptist is a favourite subject in Italian painting since the 16th century, though the evangelical text does not mention the meeting of Christ and John before baptism. Non-canonical texts say that after flight into Egypt the Holy Family stayed with Maria’s relatives where the little John treated Christ with particular veneration. This canvas is from the collection of West-European painting of the Tyumen Museum and Educational Society and dates back to the so-called Madonna with the Blue Diadem by Raphael Santi. The precise time and authorship of the picture Madonna with the Blue Diadem is not known. Presumably, it was created jointly with Raphael’s pupil Gianfrancesco Penni. According to some sources, the picture appeared approximately in 1510–1511, others date it to 1512-1518. Currently the canvas is in the Louvre in France. One of Raphael’s favourite forms for the images of Madonna is the circle or ‘tondo.’ Masters of the Renaissance considered it ideal and harmonic since the distance from any point of the circle to the centre is the same. An imitator of Raphael in the 17th century kept the contours of a circle in his picture since for the Christian symbolism the line of the circumference having neither the beginning nor the end embodied the immortality of the soul, eternal life in true faith. There is a poetical version that Raphael discovered the format of tondo for himself after the following incident: once, while taking a walk, he was enchanted by the scene he saw: a beautiful peasant woman was feeding her baby in a nook of the market. Since the artist had no paper with him he kicked out the bottom of the barrel standing nearby in order to make a sketch for the future masterpiece on it. The picture Imitation of Raphael depicts the Madonna, the sleeping infant Christ and the little John, the future Baptist of Christ. In the general contour the group repeats the circle. The Madonna is blessing the sleep of her divine Son, while John, turning towards a viewer, points at this important moment. The Infant’s sleep is the symbol of Christ’s future death, but at the same of the future awakening, i.e. resurrection.