(Asti 1596–1676)
The Penitent Mary Magdalene,
oil on canvas, 68 x 85 cm, framed

Provenance:
Private collection, Germany;
where acquired by the present owner

The oeuvre of Theodora Caccia, better known by the name Orsola Maddalena (adopted in 1620 when she became an Ursuline nun), has only been recently reappraised following studies on women artists active during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Several of her works were shown in the exhibition Les Dames du Baroque. Femmes peintres dans l’Italie du XVIe et XVIIe siècle at the Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Ghent (2018–2019) and others are currently included in the exhibition Le signore dell’arte. Storie di donne tra ‘500 e ‘600 in the Palazzo Reale, Milan. Additionally, at the close of 2020 The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, acquired three still life paintings by the artist as well as a Madonna and Child with the Infant Saint John the Baptist.

Orsola was the daughter of the Mannerist painter Guglielmo Caccia, called il Moncalvo (1568–1625) and Laura Olivia, who was the daughter of the artist Ambrogio Oliva. Orsola was apprenticed in her father’s studio, assisting him on all of the most important sacred and secular decorative commissions in the regions of Lombardy and Piedmont of the period.

In 1620 Orsola entered the convent of Bianzé (near Vercelli) – a fate for which five of her sisters were also destined. In 1625 Guglielmo Caccia financed the building of a new monastery at Moncalvo next to his own home, and Orsola Maddalena and her sisters moved there shortly before his death. Orsola inherited her father’s studio materials and for the next fifty years directed the workshop she set up within the walls of the convent, assisted by her sisters, and later from the 1660s, also by Laura and Angelica Bottero, thereby assuring the economic survival of their small religious community.

Although influenced by her father’s technique, Orsola elaborated a personal style which is attentive to detail, as well as to developments in Lombard and Flemish painting. Despite executing numerous altarpieces, her fame especially rests on her small refined cabinet paintings which are extremely rare, representing religious subjects or still lifes and mostly painted for the nobility – indeed, among her patrons can be included the courts of both Savoy and Gonzaga.

The present canvas is of particular interest for its dense layering of religious symbolism, which suggests that it was conceived to assist spiritual meditation – and perhaps even the artist’s own, since she herself chose Magdalene as her monastic name.

Magdalene is represented in the cave at Sainte-Baume where, according to the authors Rabano Mauro and Jacopo da Varagine, she alighted following a long sea voyage from Palestine, and where she was to remain for the last thirty years of her life, converting the population of Provence to Christianity. Sainte-Baume is characterised by the presence of a water source which is represented in the painting, and from the late Middle Ages it became a major pilgrim destination, as is reflected, in this work, by the presence of the shell in the niche above the Crucifix.

The many animals that populate this scene appear to relate to the evangelical work of Magdalene: the deer being petted by Christ is an emblem of the Saviour, while the wolf with the lamb’s pelt in its mouth recalls the condition of the Christian sent to preach the Gospels: ‘like a lamb among wolves’ (Luke 10: 1-12); in many biblical passages (Genesis, Acts of the Apostles, Apocalypse) the lion represents Christ, while the rabbits, owing to the changing of their coat in spring, are associated by Saint Augustine with the theme of Resurrection. Finally, the presence of finches and goldfinches alludes to the legend that these birds, along with the robin-red-breast, were stained with Christ’s blood in their efforts to free him of the crown of thorns, and indeed, the Crucifix depicted against the stark rock-face of the cave streams with blood, to symbolise the Son of God’s sacrifice. The broken sticks at the Magdalen’s feet may allude to the triumph of the Church. A further characteristic of Orsola Caccia’s work present in this painting, are the naturalistic passages with their minutely described still lifes of flowers laden with religious symbolism.

Close points of comparison can be made between the present painting and the Madonna and Child with the Infant Saint John the Baptist by Orsola Caccia in The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. The appearance of the female figures can be compared, rendered with a stark contrast of light and shade on either side of the face; or likewise, the features of the Christ Child in each work. Additionally, there are similarities in the flowers depicted, which as mentioned, almost stand in for the artist’s signature, while the landscapes, influenced by northern art, recall those of the artist’s father, Guglielmo. On the basis of these similarities to the painting in the Metropolitan, it can be suggested the present work also dates to around 1625, during the artist’s maturity.