Saint Sebastian

According to legend, Sebastian, the soldier, died for his Christian faith around 280 during the reign of the Roman Emperor, Diocletian. Arab archers tied him to a tree and shot him with several arrows. Castulus’s widow, Irene of Rome, wanted to bury him but found he was still alive. After recovering, Sebastian decided to defend Christians. At the orders of the Emperor, he was beaten to death and his body was thrown into the Tiber. Sebastian appeared to Lucina, a Christian woman, in her dream; this enabled her to find his body and bury him. Later one of the seven Roman pilgrimage churches was built above his grave on the Via Apia.

This painting designated for private worship depicts a half figure of the saint in the spirit of the mass production of the simplified popular form of this type of painting, featuring the saint with attributes standing in front of an indifferent background.

The right hand with slightly bent fingers lifted to the heart is the motif which Lorenzo Lippi used in the first known painting created during his apprenticeship in the workshop of Matteo Rosselli (1578–1650) under the supervision of and in cooperation with Domenico Pagliani (active at the beginning of the 17th century) for the brotherhood of Madonna della Neve of the Church of St. Peter in Vaglia. The
commission from 1628 is documented in archives. He used the arm bent at the elbow with the same shadows as in the Allegory in Belfast (Ulster Museum). It was also possible to determine that similar paintings of St. Laurentius and John the Baptist belonging to privateestates were the work of Lippi thanks to the characteristic types of faces.

The Staten Museum vor Kunst in Stockholm exhibits Lippi’s drawing of a male figure holding arrows, in which we can recognize St. Sebastian. The curator of this collection determined the artist based on consultations. The attribution of Lippi was not questioned even by the author of Lippi’s monograph. There is no other St. Sebastian known in Lippi’s work and without knowing of the painting in the SNG, this drawing, which is clearly related to it, went unnoticed. The painting definitively presents Lippi’s typical style, precise drawing and clear modeling, tempered colors and clear tones. 

Zuzana Ludiková ● LUDIKOVÁ, Zuzana - BURAN, Dušan. Talianska maľba = Italian Painting. Bratislava : Slovenská národná galéria, 2013. 242 strán. ISBN 9788080591748.