Page 45 - Vision & Ecstasy - Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione's St. Francis.

‘MIRACULOUS LIKENESS’:

CASTIGLIONE’S SAINT FRANCIS IN ECSTASY

In certain senses the Matthiesen Saint Francis in Ecstasy is an
unusual, practically anomalous work by Castiglione.1 As a
devotional image of a modern saint, it stands apart from the
repertory for which the artist was and continues to be
singularly identified: scenes from the OldTestament, principally
the patriarchal journeys in Genesis, and mythological scenes
favouring bacchanalian revels.These are narratives unfolding with
the familiarity of genre and delighting in the material splendour
of still-life painting (Fig.1). Its composition, not just a single figure
but set in middle ground exaggerating its isolation, is nearly
opposite to the multiple incidents, the clamorous crowd and the
constant movement that are typical of his art. Formally too the Fig.1 G.B. CASTIGLIONE
painting is exceptional. Its rhythms are simplified and slowed. The Journey, Musée des Beaux Arts, Rouen.
palette is so restricted and tempered that it approaches the monochrome. The underlying design and specific
drawing are more measured and incisive. The paint handling is not only loaded and fine in the accenting impasto
but, using smaller brushes for much of the work, subtly differentiated and texturing of the surface throughout.
Most striking of all, while Castiglione’s personalities are elusive as a rule and generally ambiguous in their
communication of an emotional state, this Francis is very different in his engagement and poignancy.According

1. The painting was first published by H. Brigstocke, ‘Castiglione: two recently discovered paintings and new thoughts on his
development’, The Burlington Magazine, CXXII (1980), pp. 292-98, and presented byThe Matthiesen Gallery, Important Italian
Baroque Paintings,1600-1700, catalogue of the exhibition, London 1980, cat. no. 16. The most substantial subsequent discussions
are: M. Newcome, inWarsaw, Royal Castle: Opus sacrum:Catalogue of the Exhibition from the Collection of Barbara Piasecka Johnson,
catalogue of the exhibition,Warsaw 1990, cat. no. 44; andT. Standring, in Genoa,Accademia Ligustica: Il Genio di G.B.Castiglione,
Il Grechetto, catalogue of the exhibition, 1990, cat. no. 29. I am very grateful toTimothy Standring for generously sharing his
file on the painting,‘revised last: 6/17/99.’

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