Page 34 - Vision & Ecstasy - Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione's St. Francis.

Fig. 3. AGOSTINO CARACCI AFTER FRANCESCOVANNI Fig. 4. ANNIBALE CARACCI

St Francis and the Angel St Francis, Museo dell’Academia,Venice

clad in a threadbare habit, his feet painfully distorted, clutches a cross and skull alone on a bleak hillside. But
behind him the great blaze of the sun declares his future glory, his rise to God through suffering and meditation.
A print by Agostino Carracci after FrancescoVanni takes up the theme of the ravaged and ascetic St Francis, his
nourishment a meagre handful of roots, his head wearily resting against the shadowed head of Christ on the Cross.
(Fig. 3)This brought into art a new theme, which became very popular in the 17th century, of St Francis consoled
by a music making angel.The Little Flowers of St Francis, a favourite early source, describes how, after a vigorous
fast on Mount La Verna ‘suddenly there appeared to him an angel in great splendour, who had a viol in his left
hand and in his right hand a bow; and while St Francis stood stupefied at the vision the angel drew the bow once
across the viol, and immediately there was heard such a sweet melody that his soul was inebriated with sweetness,

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