(Florence 1611–1698)
Saint Agatha attended by Saint Peter and an Angel in Prison,
oil on canvas, 147 x 110 cm, framed

Provenance:
possibly Camillo Del Chiaro collection, Florence (1649);
Private collection, Conegliano Veneto, Treviso

Documentation:
possibly Archivio di Stato di Firenze, Compagnie religiose soppresse, Compagnia della Purificazione della Vergine e di San Zanobi, n. 1674, Ricevute Del Chiaro (1590–1682), 1649 (21st June): “Io Simone Pignoni pittore ò riceuto dal signor Camillo del Chiaro scudi quattordici, tanti sono per averli fatto un quadro di una Santa Aghata e scudi dua ò riceuto per a buon conto di un altro a me suddetto contanti. Scudi 16” [‘I Simone Pignoni received fourteen scudi from signor Camillo del Chiaro as many as for making him a painting of a Saint Agatha, and I have received two scudi as the deposit for another, as above, I have received. Scudi 16’];
possibly Archivio di Stato di Firenze, Compagnie religiose soppresse, Compagnia della Purificazione della Vergine e di San Zanobi, n. 1674, Ricevute Del Chiaro (1590–1682), 1649 (3rd December): “Io Simone Pignoni pittore ò riceuto dal signor Camillo Del Chiaro scudi ventotto per resto di dua quadri, un Sant’Aghata e in uno S.ta Lucia, a me suddetto contanti. Scudi 28” [‘I Simone Pignoni received twenty-eight scudi from signor Camillo del Chiaro as the balance on two paintings, a Saint Agatha and a Saint Lucy, I have received. Scudi 28’]

Literature:
F. Moro, Viaggio nel Seicento toscano: dipinti e disegni inediti, Mantua 2006, pp. 209-210, fig. 7;
F. Baldassari, Simone Pignoni (Firenze 1611–1698), Turin 2008, p. 121, no. 54 and pl. XV, p. 63

The present painting represents an episode from the life of Saint Agatha, a young noblewoman of Catania, who, refusing to renounce her Christian faith, was condemned to have her breasts amputated by the Roman proconsul Quinziano. In this work the Florentine painter Simone Pignoni represents, with the sensual delicacy of touch that is typical of his brush, the moment when Saint Peter visited the young noblewoman in her cell and miraculously healed her wounds. Saint Agatha is represented in a pose of abandon as she reclines letting the saint apply his ointments; behind her an angel holds a candle and assists at the scene.

A second smaller (102 x 85 cm) version of the present painting is in the Civici Musei di Storia ed Arte di Trieste. It differs from the present painting in that it lacks the band of light falling from the right, and the Saint’s breast and stomach are undressed. Francesca Baldassari has proposed that one of these two canvases is the one cited in the document of 1649, in which Pignoni declares himself to have been paid an initial deposit and some months later a final payment from Camillo del Chiaro for a Saint Agatha and a Saint Lucy. It is hard to tell if the latter is the painting preserved in the Hermitage Saint Petersburg (141 x 114 cm), the painting in the Cei collection (126 x 96.5 cm) or another version belonging to the Caripit of Pistoia (130 x 103 cm). In any case, given the similarities of size with the various versions of the Saint Lucy the scholar has suggested that the present Saint Agatha under discussion here is possibly the one cited in the documents. A preparatory drawing for the figure of the Saint Agatha is preserved in the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, Lyon (inv. 5799/A).

Simone Pignoni was initially apprenticed to Domenico Cresti called il Passignano during the 1620s, he subsequently completed his artistic training with Francesco Furini from whom he derived a predilection for sentimental subjects. His long and successful career was spent at the service of private patrons and religious institutions in Florence and in other Tuscan centres. His work is distinguished by its soft and sensual pictorial technique and its great pathos, which at times reaches moments of great contemplative intimacy, as in the case of the highly intense Saint Agatha under discussion here.