Object Record
Images
Metadata
Catalog number |
P63 |
Artist |
Reni, Guido |
Title |
St. Christopher Carrying the Christ Child |
Date |
17th Century |
Object Name |
Etching |
Description |
This print, attributed to the Bolognese painter and printmaker Guido Reni (1575-1642), depicts an image that has its roots in medieval manuscript illumination. The early martyr St. Christopher is pictured here with his usual attribute of a staff, carrying the Christ child across a river, and struggling under the child's weight, which was said to have equaled the weight of the world. However, in its exaggerated musculature and antique form, this figure resembles many depictions of the Titan Atlas or Aeneas from Homer's Iliad. Such a highly classicized representation of a religious figure reflects the influence of Greek and Latin texts, the new science of anatomy, and the art of antiquity on scholars, theologians, and artists of humanist centers like Bologna, as well as the Christian humanist teachings of Desiderius Erasmus that emphasized the consistency of Christian scriptures with ancient philosophies. The valued literary tradition of 'The Golden Legend", a medieval text detailing the lives of the saints, with strong moral overtones, continued with the advent of the printing press and increased as a result of the Protestant Reformation's discrediting of new canonizations, rejection of the veneration of relics, and denunciation of medieval hagiography. To reassert the authority of the Church and the power of Christian martyrs, Jesuit missionary campaigns oversaw the mass distribution of the Ecclesiae "militantis triumphi", a print series that bolstered the strength and influence of early martyrs and championed the importance of the saints as moral role models and intercessors in private devotion. The prints were cheaply made and would have been accessible to members of different social classes, appealing to both the illiterate and to the growing population of lettered Christians. Laura Stevenson, in "SCHOLARS, EXPLORERS, PRIESTS, How the Renaissance Gave Us the Modern World," ex. cat. G -T M, Queens College, CUNY, February 2 - March 27, 2010, 18. |
Medium/Material |
Ink on paper |
Dimensions |
H-10.25 W-8 inches |
Year Range from |
1600 |
Year Range to |
1617 |
Exhibition and Publication History |
* "Italian Art, 15th to 18th Century: Selections from the Permanent Col.," G-TM, 1986, # 8, ill. and discussion p. 17, Suzanna Simor, Curator. * "SCHOLARS, EXPLORERS, PRIESTS, How the Renaissance Gave Us the Modern World," Curated by James M. Saslow, G -T M, Queens College, CUNY, February 2 - March 27, 2010, # 18, ill. |
Culture |
Italian |