The painting falls within the typology of “sacred conversations” in horizontal format with the Madonna and saints in the foreground and a landscape in the background: one of the most popular and popular subjects in the sixteenth century in Veneto, favored above all by private clients.

The figures, in the absence of an architectural structure that frames them, acquire great naturalness. Following the death of Palma, the painting was completed by Titian, as confirmed by studies carried out on the occasion of the recent restoration. He would have made the head and mantle of Saint Catherine, and the landscape in the background. Reflectographic and radiographic analyzes also reveal some variations made by Palma in a first draft of the composition: two male figures under the San Giovanni, perhaps two donors, and the child's face turned towards them. In place of the hilly landscape, an architectural wing was planned.