The Martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew
XVII century. Oil on canvas.Not on display
According to Camilo´s contemporaries, he was outstanding at depicting delicate matters. As Palomino put it, his genius was strongly inclined towards the soft and devout. The violent subject of Saint Bartholomew´s flaying is therefore exceptional in his production and it draws on various compositions by other artists. The overall scheme necessarily recalls Ribera and his well-known print of the same event, although it is really closer to the canvas now at the Stockholm Museum, which he may have known directly. The posture of the main executioner, who holds a knife in his teeth as he pulls the skin from the saint´s raised arm, is practically identical in both compositions, but Camilo´s interpretation, at least in this figure, is notably softer: the executioner looks away from the wound and lacks the cold indifference of Ribera´s henchman. The other executioner, seen from the back with a raised arm, appears to be drawn from classic Roman-Bolognese art.