Ecce Homo

oil on canvas

60 x 50 cm.

In frame 79 x 69 cm.

The proposed work, depicting the intense image of Christ crowned with thorns, picks up on the iconography of Ecce homo devised by Guido Reni, a theme so celebrated in the artist's career and later replicated in numerous variants, with slight differences from each other, bearing witness to the enormous success achieved.

The closest iconographic parallels are found above all with the painting in the Gemäldegalerie in Dresden, but also with those in the Galleria Corsini in Rome (link) and the Louvre.

One can admire the half-length figure of Christ against a monochrome background, wearing the crown of thorns, a symbol of royalty, given to him by the soldiers to mock him during his imprisonment. His hands are certainly bound by the same rope that encircles his neck and ties the simple purple cloth, also alluding to the royal cloak.

In the canvas transpires the author's ability to show not only the physical, but also the psychological description of Christ who, looking upwards, appears physically and emotionally exhausted and suffering. Nevertheless, his image is touched by an indescribable grace, facilitated by the refinement of the palette and a soft, enveloping luminosity.

With regard to our version, it is a work that exhibits such painterly precision and elegant composure that it can easily be compared to the earlier Rhineland models; however, the draftsmanship and luminosity seem to lead the dating to a later time.

 Indeed, the dramatic nature of the image appears here to be filtered through the examples of naturalistic painting, here revisited in virtue of a classicist sensibility and thus more pertinent to the 18th century.

In our opinion, the work can be attributed to the hand of Francesco Trevisani (Capodistria 1656 - Rome 1746), a painter who approached this subject on several occasions, including the Ecce Homo in the Fabrizio Lemme collection, the two sold at Sotheby's in London on 9 July 2009 and at Christie's in New York on 22 May 1998 (see imm.1), and the one at the Musée des Beaux-Arts et d'Archéologie de Besançon (link).

The conservation condition of the work is very good, there are restorations visible in the illustrative photographic material.