In 1569 the painter Lelio Orsi gave the drawing of the Madonna della Ghiara to the devout citizen of Reggio, Luca Pratissoli, who commissioned Giovanni Bianchi (known as il Bertone) to transpose it into fresco on the boundary wall of the Convent of the Servi di Maria. The drawing was then donated by Alfonso Pichi Pratissoli to the Lay Factory of the Ghiara Temple in 1705.
In Orsi's singular iconography, the Child is seated on a pillow while the Virgin sits on a rock and is turned towards her Son in the act of adoring him. The solutions adopted with refined Mannerist language testify to the great mastery of the artist also as a draftsman.