(Cento 1591–1666 Bologna)
Saint Francis receiving the Stigmata,
oil on canvas, 113 x 94 cm, framed

We are grateful to Nicholas Turner for confirming the attribution after examination of the present painting in the orginal and for his help in cataloguing this lot.

This previously unknown painting by Guercino is in Turner’s opinion a large-sized modello for his altarpiece of Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata, oil on canvas, 264 x 176 cm (see N. Turner, The Paintings of Guercino. A Revised and Expanded Catalogue raisonné, Rome 2017, no. 196). This was painted in 1633 for the high altar of the church of San Francesco, in the town of San Giovanni in Persiceto, Bologna, and is now in San Giovanni Battista, Campello Monti, a church in a small village in the mountains of Piedmont (see fig. 1). The altarpiece has been discussed in Guercino: Il ‘San Francesco’ ritrovato, exhibition catalogue, ed. by F. Gonzales and R. Vitiello, Novara, Palazzo dei Vescovi, and San Giovanni in Persiceto, Museo d’Arte Sacra, 2006–7.

Minor compositional changes between the two canvases, as well as many differences in detail, show that without a doubt the present modello preceded the altarpiece. Multiple adjustments bear witness to Guercino’s never-ending quest to refine his ideas, even at this late stage in the realisation of the project. Among the more important compositional changes between these two phases is the depiction of the saint’s upper body in its surrounding space. In the present picture, in the interval between the saint’s outstretched arms and the background, are two strips of blue sky that are significantly broader than their cloudier equivalents in the altarpiece. Pentiments for the upper edge of both sleeves in the present modello indicate that his arms were at first painted even higher. These broad ribbons of cloudless sky between the saint’s arms and the cliffs beyond create the illusion, perhaps intentionally, that the saint’s body is detaching itself from its earthly context and rising gently upwards. The impression was corrected in the altarpiece, where narrower strips of mostly cloud-filled sky seem to bring his body back down to earth, anchoring it snugly within the narrow valley behind.

In the transition from modello to finished altarpiece, other smaller modifications may be observed, which again point to the modello’s precedence in the creative process. To the sensitive eye, the line made by the foreground rock as it meets the ground might appear too straight, too manmade, despite the distraction of two stones, one large and one small, that nestle alongside it. In the altarpiece, however, this impression is counteracted by the appearance of a slight concavity, followed by a convexity, at the bottom of the slab, giving a more natural weathered appearance to the rock. The two stones were retained, though different in size, and located further away from the rock.

Further differences in detail between the two canvases can be seen in the increased scale in the altarpiece of the figure of Brother Leo, Saint Francis’s companion, who sleeps uncomfortably on his side against a distant rock. Other differences concern the composition’s format: the absence of bands of sky and foreground, at the top and bottom of the modello, account for the greater relative height of the altarpiece composition. Guercino may well have felt that he could improvise the painting of both these neutral passages when working on the altarpiece. At this stage, however, the composition may well not have extended as high. What the modello lacks in height, it gains in width, since its composition extends significantly both to left and right, to include more space in front of the sleeping Brother Leo (to the left), and behind the kneeling Saint Francis (to the right). The shorter, broader composition of the modello may never have been intended to reach the height of the altarpiece, perhaps indicating that earlier in the process a different format was considered.

Until recently, it was widely accepted that Guercino, exploiting his exceptional pictorial skills, worked directly on the canvas with his preparatory drawings at his side, thus meaning that he did not waste time painting bozzetti or large-scale modelli for demanding patrons as previews of his major commissions. In recent years, a handful of bozzetti have come to light, in which the composition, lighting and colours for a given work were explored in paint on canvas to clarify the compositional ideas for a given picture. This practice was carried out either for the patron who was paying a large sum of money for a picture, or for Guercino’s own ends as the process helped him crystallise his ideas. Guercino’s surviving bozzetti - rapidly painted, small-scale sketches in oil on canvas - include his Saint Jerome Seated in a Landscape Reading from a Book, in the Graf Harrach’sche Familiensammlung, Schloss Rohrau, Niederösterreich, painted circa 1618 (see N. Turner, op. cit. 2017, no. 64), which is a first idea for his Saint Jerome Sealing a Letter, known from two versions, one in the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Antica, Palazzo Barberini, Rome, and the other in a private collection, Rome, which would have been painted soon after (see Turner, op. cit., 2017, nos. 65–6); and his Christ Appearing to his Mother, sold at Dorotheum, 18 October 2017, as lot 83, which was a preparatory study, with some minor differences, for his great altarpiece of the subject in the Pinacoteca Civica, Cento, painted in 1628–30 (see Turner, op. cit., 2017, no. 161).
Since the present Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata is about a quarter of the area of the corresponding altarpiece in Campello Monti (whose dimensions have been slightly altered by canvas strips added to the bottom and left), the enlargement of the composition to the surface of the larger canvas could well have been at the simple ratio of 1:4. The exact nature of the process is yet another mystery in Guercino’s exceptional and highly efficient practice as a painter.