Saint Jerome Penitent

Oil painting on canvas

85 x 64 cm.

In frame 97 x 76 cm.

This splendid painting, which offers us an intense representation of San Girolamo Penitente, a doctor of the Church who lived between the 4th and 5th centuries, is a work of remarkable quality and pictorial refinement, testimony of the mature Venetian Renaissance, painted in the Venetian area around the end of the sixteenth century.

The multifaceted figure of the saint, hermit, penitent, cardinal and fine humanist, who translated the Bible into Latin, enjoyed great success between the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the supreme example of the harmony between classical age knowledge and Christian virtue. For this reason it was a subject dear to a refined and cultured public, not infrequently illustrated in small works intended for private devotion.

The elderly saint is depicted half-naked, according to the typical iconography that sees him in the guise of a hermit, while, kneeling, he hits his chest with a stone as a sign of penance. We see him with his gaze intent on contemplating the crucifix and the open book, both of his canonical iconographic attributes, referring to his fruitful activity as a biblical scholar and theologian, who made him the forerunner of the Renaissance humanist.

San Girolamo is represented in a mountainous and wild landscape, near the cave of Bethlehem where he retreated to follow his vocation as a hermit, at the bottom of which opens the view of a city, emblem of the contrast between nature and civilization.

Examining the stylistic characteristics, the composition is undoubtedly indebted to the models created by Jacopo Negretti known as Palma the Younger (Venice 1548-1628), who repeatedly approached the subject with multiple illustrative methods.

The brightness that envelops the scene is clearly of Venetian origin: the composition is crossed by an intense glow that radiates the figure of the Saint, emphasizing the rather sober chromatic range, played on earthy tones.

The painting, whose excellent conditions offer us an optimal reading, denotes a very precise and quality brushstroke. Examination under wood's lamp does not show significant restorations, but some retouching scattered on the surface.

The work is accompanied by a photographic authenticity expertise in accordance with the law.

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