Full title | Saint Lucy |
---|---|
Artist | Carlo Crivelli |
Artist dates | about 1430/5 - about 1494 |
Series | Four Panels from an Altarpiece, Ascoli Piceno |
Date made | about 1476 |
Medium and support | Tempera on lime |
Dimensions | 91 x 26.5 cm |
Acquisition credit | Bought, 1868 |
Inventory number | NG788.12 |
Location | Not on display |
Collection | Main Collection |
This elegant woman is Saint Lucy. She once stood on the Virgin’s left in a small altarpiece which Crivelli painted for a side chapel in the church of San Domenico, in Ascoli Piceno in the Italian Marche. Lucy holds her cactus-like martyr’s palm in one hand, and a circular wooden plate in the other. On the trencher are pair of hooded, oval eyes which cast shadows on the golden wood: Lucy’s eyes were removed as part of her martyrdom (she is now the patron saint of opticians).
In a detail typical of Crivelli, her elongated, bony toes in their pointed red sandals poke out over the edge of the marble parapet on which she stands, linking her heavenly space with ours.
This elegant lady is Saint Lucy. She once stood on the Virgin’s left in a small altarpiece which Crivelli painted for a side chapel in the church of San Domenico, in Ascoli Piceno in the Italian Marche. At once sinuous and solid, she is the counterpart of Saint Michael who would have stood at the other end of the polyptych. Lucy’s aristocratic pallor, golden locks and fine outfit all echo his, down to the green, pink and gold of her cloak which falls in weighty folds around her feet. Even the decoration of the parapet below her, where boughs of pears grow out the ears of a curly-headed putto, recalls the ears and head of Satan in the Michael panel.
In a detail typical of Crivelli, her elongated, bony toes in their pointed red sandals poke out over the edge of the marble parapet on which she stands, linking her heavenly space with ours. Her upturned gaze would originally have rested on the Lamentation over the Dead Christ in the centre of the altarpiece.
Lucy holds her cactus-like martyr’s palm in one hand and a circular wooden plate it other. On this rests a pair of hooded, oval eyes, looking disconcertingly like chocolates; they cast oval shadows on the golden wood. According to her legend, Lucy was a Christian convert in third-century Rome, whose mother tried to force her into marriage with a pagan. She refused, having decided to dedicate her life to Christ, and so her frustrated bridegroom denounced her to the authorities. The Roman governor sentenced Lucy to forced prostitution as punishment, but when the guards came to carry out her sentence, the Holy Ghost made her body so heavy it was impossible to lift. She was then put to death after having her eyes removed. She is now the patron saint of opticians.
Although she lived in the third century, Lucy is dressed as a fashionable fifteenth-century lady. She wears a gold jacket embroidered with flowers and foliage, with a broad gold collar and elaborate clasps of raised and gilded pastiglia. The fastenings down the front have been left open to reveal her linen shift. She wears a necklace of pearls, symbols of chastity, from which hangs a ruby pendant. Her hair is pulled back from her high forehead – as was the fashion at the time – and wound in elaborate curls around a circlet of pearls. On her head is a veil so transparent as to be almost invisible. Her smart red sandals are an antiquarian detail: Crivelli has included them as a nod to the kind of sandals worn in ancient Rome.
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Four Panels from an Altarpiece, Ascoli Piceno
These panels came from an altarpiece which Crivelli painted for a side chapel in the Dominican church at Ascoli Piceno, in the Italian Marche. The saints are identifiable by their attributes: Saint Michael, Prince of Archangels, fighting the devil; Saint Jerome, one of the Doctors of the Church, with his tame lion; Saint Peter Martyr, the second saint of the Dominican Order, a knife buried in his skull; and Saint Lucy, with her eyes on a wooden dish. The choice of saints must have had a special meaning to the original patron.
Although we don’t know who commissioned this polyptych (multi-panelled altarpiece), plainly no expense was spared. The saints’ haloes and damask backgrounds would have sparkled and flickered in the candlelight of the Middle Ages, and lit the church with a glittering golden glow.
These panels came from an altarpiece which Crivelli painted for a side chapel in the Dominican church at Ascoli Piceno, in the Italian Marche. Crivelli painted two altarpieces for San Domenico, and their history is complex and intertwined.
In 1476 he was commissioned to do a large polyptych (a multi-panelled altarpiece) for the main altar. Shortly after, he painted a smaller altarpiece for one of the chapels in the nave. Five panels from this survive: these four, and a Virgin and Child (now in Budapest). The whole was probably topped with a Lamentation over the Dead Christ, now lost.
In the nineteenth century parts of both were sold to a Russian prince, who mounted them in a grand frame to make a three-tiered altarpiece for the chapel of his villa in Florence. The whole complex is known after him as the Demidoff Altarpiece. In the 1960s the four saints in the upper tier were removed and are now displayed separately. Saints Michael and Lucy are still in their nineteenth-century frames, Jerome and Saint Peter Martyr without.
San Domenico was the church of the Dominican Order, one of the two chief mendicant – from the Latin word mendicare (‘to beg’) – orders of the Middle Ages. The Dominicans were friars who, although they took religious vows, were not confined to a monastery but lived in towns and cities. Founded in the thirteenth century to provide educated preachers and teachers for a growing urban population, they were vowed to poverty, although this did not prevent them commissioning costly works of art. San Domenico was a small church, and typically for the Franciscans and Dominicans, relied heavily on lay men and women for financial support. Fra Constanzo, the prior who oversaw San Domenico’s restoration in the late fifteenth century, raised funds by encouraging the laity to found private side chapels in the nave, and local families strove to outdo each other each other both artistically and spiritually in their decoration.
Unlike the high altar at the east end behind the screen, altarpieces in these chapels were clearly visible to the general public, though often screened off by iron gates. The altarpiece from which these came was quite small – the panels are less than 1 metre high – but of a very high quality. Although we don’t know who commissioned it, plainly no expense was spared. The panels were once set in a gilded frame with rounded arches, outlines of which can be seen on the panels of Jerome and Dominic. The saints’ haloes and the damask backgrounds are very similar to those Crivelli had used on the slightly earlier high altarpiece. They would have sparkled and flickered in the candlelight of the Middle Ages, and lit the church with a glittering golden glow.
The saints are identifiable by their attributes. Saint Michael, as Prince of Archangels and commander of the heavenly host, was in the place of honour on the Virgin’s right, with Saint Jerome, one of the Doctors of the Church, beside him. On the Virgin’s left were Saint Peter Martyr, the second saint of the Dominican Order and dedicatee of the chapel which housed the altar, and Saint Lucy. The choice of saints must have had a special meaning to the original patron.




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