This painting is one of the many copies of this famous composition by Guercino, whose original of close dimensions is in the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin (inv. No 70.1, 1620, Oil on canvas, 89 x 75´7 cm).
Historian Denis Mahon has masterfully shown that this painting and two other famous works by Guercino -Lot and his daughters (Monastery of El Escorial, Madrid) and The return of the Prodigal Son (Galleria Sabauda, Turin)- were painted for Cardinal Alessandro Ludovisi in 1617 and 1618, while the artist was in Bologna.According to the Old Testament (Daniel:13), Archian and Sedechia were two elderly
A youthful looking angel with curly hair imperiously points out the path of freedom to an astonished Saint Peter, depicted as a man of advanced age confined in a prison. In the background, clad in a suit of armour, the gaoler sleeps, impervious to what is going on behind his back. The two main figures are attired in vaguely classical dress: that of the angel is simple but sumptuous, in accordance
According to this saint´s story, he was walking along the seaside meditating about the mystery of the Holy Trinity when he saw a boy filling a hole in the sand with seawater. Saint Augustine asked what he was doing and the boy answered that he was trying to empty the sea by pouring all its water into that hole. Upon hearing his answer, the saint said that that was impossible. The boy´s answer was
María Magdalena es una de las santas más célebres del cristianismo, por haber conocido a Cristo y porque representó el paradigma de la mujer arrepentida. En su etapa de vida mundana suele caracterizarse con ricas vestiduras. Cuando se muestra como mujer arrepentida -como en esta pintura de Guercino- aparece semidesnuda y con largos cabellos, adorando el crucifijo. Otros dos de sus atributos más re
San Juan Bautista aparece representado de medio cuerpo. La obra copia la composición análoga de Guercino, datada hacia 1645, que conserva la Pinacoteca Capitolina de Roma (inv. PC 286), donde ingresó en 1748 con la compra de la colección Sacchetti. Pérez Sánchez (1965) la consideró erróneamente copia de Guido Reni. (Información actualizada por el Departamento de Pintura Italiana y Francesa hasta 1
Guido Reni`s painting shows a young Cupid facing the viewer, with the seashore behind him, his left leg bent and left foot resting on a slab of stone. Cupid raises his left hand to a dove and with his right hand holds his bow. The loosened bowstring indicates that he has been disarmed; his remaining arrows lie in a quiver discarded on the ground. The subject appears to be a variation of Love tamed
En el dibujo aparece San Jerónimo sentado sobre unas rocas, semidesnudo, con un crucifijo entre las manos y meditando entre sus escritos. Estilísticamente corresponde a los dibujos fechados en la década de 1630. A pesar de las numerosas versiones pictóricas que Guercino hizo del tema de San Jerónimo, el dibujo no corresponde a ninguna de ellas.La faceta de Guercino como dibujante se relaciona estr
This drawing was first identified by Manuela Mena Marqués as a preparatory study for Prophet Jeremiah, one of a group of six prophets painted in fresco by Guercino for the cupola of Piacenza’s cathedral in 1627. Sir Denis Mahon, the renowned Guercino scholar, had separately noted other studies relating to the same commission, including some related to the figure of Jeremiah.Commissioned by
This drawing, formerly in the Spanish Royal Collection, was recognised as an autograph work by Guercino by Manuela Mena Marqués. The suggested date for it is around the 1650-60, when Guercino had attained artistic maturity, a date that stylistically seems correct. Mena Marqués also proposed that the drawing stood alone and was not intended as a preparatory work for a painting, a hypo