Attributed to Antonio Tempesta (Italian, 1555 - 1630)
The Baptism of Christ, circa 1620 - 1630
oil on alabaster
42 x 63 cm
16 ½ x 24 ¾ in
16 ½ x 24 ¾ in
7215
Further images
The production of paintings on alabaster and other stone supports flourished in the late sixteenth century, most notably in Florence and Rome; a reference to the Venetian Sebastiano del Piombo...
The production of paintings on alabaster and other stone supports flourished in the late sixteenth century, most notably in Florence and Rome; a reference to the Venetian Sebastiano del Piombo painting on stone is recorded as early as 1530. Earlier examples are painted on marble and slate, but as trade routes developed, more types of stone became available, including alabaster, lapis lazuli, onyx, jasper, agate, and amethyst.
Painters used these supports to attain a high level of finish, and capitalised on the natural contours and colours offered by the stone to guide and enhance their compositions, for example in the profiles of the landscapes in the present work. The stone figuring helps to create the bank of the River Jordan where John the Baptist stands and similarly the attendant angels on the other side; the tight figuring around Christ's feet gives a sense of the water eddying by and then again the stone naturally offers a sense of cloud formations in the sky placing God the Father a celestial setting above the depiction of The Holy Spirit.
Paintings on stone were clearly prized, and examples are recorded in the inventories of the most distinguished collecting dynasties across western Europe, including the Medici, Colonna and Savoy families.
The stone support is possibly alabastro di Busca, from Cuneo, Piedmont (examples of which can be found in the Faustino Corsi Collection of Decorative Stones, University of Oxford, nos. 359 & 360). A seminal exhibition on this subject was held at the Saint Louis Art Museum in 2022 (Paintings on Stone: Science and the Sacred 1530-1800, 20 February-15 May 2022, curated by Judith W. Mann). In her article on stone supports in the accompanying catalogue Judy Mann discusses the vitality of the trade in stone used for painting. She notes that it is rare to find large paintings on alabaster primarily becuase of its expense, but it was very easy to work with . A list of sales drawn up by Teodoro della Porta in 1610 mentions some antique alabaster "sawn into various rectangles...sold to painters around Rome to paint upon which yielded many scudi".
Source Image:
Whilst the baptism of Christ had long been a popular subject in art, the staging of the scene marks a development in the iconography of the story. In this depiction, Christ is placed off centre, immersed in the River Jordon, angels gaze at him from the left, St John the Baptist stands raised on the riverbanks to the right, the Holy Spirit appears as a dove above the baptismal shell and God emerges from the clouds watching over all. The imagery of this scene develops from the work of the Florentine artist Francesco Salviati (1510–1563). A notable early 17th Century painting on alabaster of The Baptism of Christ is held in the V&A collection and is recorded as being after a design by Salviati. Whilst Salviati’s own Baptism of Christ has unfortunately been lost, Renaissance artists were inspired create their own engravings after his image, which were widely distributed in print across Western Europe. Most significantly for this painting on alabaster, the source appears to be Cornelis Cort’s 1575 engraving The Baptism of Christ, After Francesco Salviati. Cort’s prints can be found in several important European collections including that of the Biblioteca del Real Monasterio, a Renaissance library in Madrid.
There is further evidence of Cort’s composition acting as inspiration for Spanish artists with the painting of The Baptism of Christ by renowned Spanish artist Bartolomé Esteban Murillo in 1655. The composition of this work is more intimate and emotional, characteristics of the Baroque, but the similarities between Cort’s engraving and the alabaster painting are undeniable. Cort’s engraving depicts the scene as one of grandeur and action, with tumbling cherubim, whereas Murillo chooses to show the story as a deeply personal moment between Christ and his cousin. The alabaster painting can be seen as a bridge between these two images, embodying characteristics of both; the drama of Cort’s work and the tenderness of Murillo’s, alongside its own unique qualities.
Attribution:
Paintings on stone were a rarity in comparison to the more common mediums of wood panel and canvas, however their popularity increased throughout the late Renaissance and Baroque periods. A small but significant cadre of artists concentrated in Rome and Florence grew to be masters of the craft and none more so than Antonio Tempesta. Tempesta (1555 – 1630) was a celebrated Florentine painter and engraver who favoured dramatic landscape scenes and stories. Following his death, Tempesta was remember primarily as an engraver, but in more recent times his exceptional stone paintings have come to light and are now appreciated as some of the finest examples of the genre.
Tempesta’s work stands apart from other stone painters, not just for his skill and creativity, but for the size of his paintings and the way that he worked with and not against the natural grain of the stone, incorporating it as part of the composition. Many Renaissance and Baroque paintings on colourful stones are exquisite but small curiosities, often found as panels in part of a larger work or object. Tempesta, in contrast, painted on large singular surfaces of patterned stone, often greater than 30cm squared in size. The very nature of this work shows the esteem in which Tempesta was held by his patrons. At the time, semi-precious stones were extortionately expensive and required transporting great distances from where they were originally mined. Not only would a patron need to pay an artist for their skills, but they would also have to afford the prohibitive cost required for these most precious of materials. Sizeable paintings on stones such as alabaster could, therefore, only be commissioned by wealthiest and most powerful patrons. Tempesta’s work can be found in the collections of Europe’s most importance and cultured men, including Rudolf II’s Kunst-und Wunderkammer, Cosimo II’s Uffizi Tribuna and the treasuries of many Roman cardinals.
Perhaps the most defining quality of Tempesta’s oeuvre is the way in which he worked with the natural patterns of the stone and used them to help tell the story behind the image. Other artists would often paint a background over some or most of the stone, leaving only small amounts of the original surface visible. Tempesta chose not to work against the challenges of the material, but to embrace them. He favoured the use of alabaster as a support and in this painting, we see how the natural veins in the stone have been used to create and enhance depiction of the riverbanks, the Holy Dove and God himself. Similar examples can be found in Tempesta’s other works such as Joseph Explaining His Dream to His Brothers. Whilst The Baptism of Christ is unsigned, defining features such as the use of alabaster as a support, the large size of the painting and the way in which the natural pattern of the stone has been used, are all hallmarks of Tempesta’s work.
In Antonio Tempesta’s Paintings on Stone and the Development of a Genre in 17th-Century Italy, Johanna Beate Lohff writes:
‘A distinctive feature of his paintings on stone is the perfect integration of the stone’s patterning into the composition, which makes it almost impossible for the beholder to distinguish the boundary between Nature and Art. In comparison to the often miniature-like paintings on patterned and semiprecious stones, his paintings are fairly large. Thus, already the sheer amount of material used in combination with the actual painting made his pictures to exceptional collectors’ items.’
Origin:
With the passing of the centuries, a complete record of Tempesta’s movements no longer exists, however works by him that were created for the Spanish court remain. In 1612, Tempesta created a celebrated series of etchings depicting the life of Marguerite of Austria, the Queen Consort of King Phillip II of Spain. This series of works strongly suggests his presence in the country and the high likelihood of him having noble and ecclesiastical Spanish patrons. There are records of a growing export market of paintings from Italy to Spain as the Renaissance develops. The Convent of the Annunciation located in Salamanca, Spain, holds a little known but impressive collection of 17th Century paintings on stone. These works which now form part of the Carmelite Museum of Alba de Tormes indicate an appetite and appreciation for the unique medium of paintings on stone among the Spanish audience.
Painters used these supports to attain a high level of finish, and capitalised on the natural contours and colours offered by the stone to guide and enhance their compositions, for example in the profiles of the landscapes in the present work. The stone figuring helps to create the bank of the River Jordan where John the Baptist stands and similarly the attendant angels on the other side; the tight figuring around Christ's feet gives a sense of the water eddying by and then again the stone naturally offers a sense of cloud formations in the sky placing God the Father a celestial setting above the depiction of The Holy Spirit.
Paintings on stone were clearly prized, and examples are recorded in the inventories of the most distinguished collecting dynasties across western Europe, including the Medici, Colonna and Savoy families.
The stone support is possibly alabastro di Busca, from Cuneo, Piedmont (examples of which can be found in the Faustino Corsi Collection of Decorative Stones, University of Oxford, nos. 359 & 360). A seminal exhibition on this subject was held at the Saint Louis Art Museum in 2022 (Paintings on Stone: Science and the Sacred 1530-1800, 20 February-15 May 2022, curated by Judith W. Mann). In her article on stone supports in the accompanying catalogue Judy Mann discusses the vitality of the trade in stone used for painting. She notes that it is rare to find large paintings on alabaster primarily becuase of its expense, but it was very easy to work with . A list of sales drawn up by Teodoro della Porta in 1610 mentions some antique alabaster "sawn into various rectangles...sold to painters around Rome to paint upon which yielded many scudi".
Source Image:
Whilst the baptism of Christ had long been a popular subject in art, the staging of the scene marks a development in the iconography of the story. In this depiction, Christ is placed off centre, immersed in the River Jordon, angels gaze at him from the left, St John the Baptist stands raised on the riverbanks to the right, the Holy Spirit appears as a dove above the baptismal shell and God emerges from the clouds watching over all. The imagery of this scene develops from the work of the Florentine artist Francesco Salviati (1510–1563). A notable early 17th Century painting on alabaster of The Baptism of Christ is held in the V&A collection and is recorded as being after a design by Salviati. Whilst Salviati’s own Baptism of Christ has unfortunately been lost, Renaissance artists were inspired create their own engravings after his image, which were widely distributed in print across Western Europe. Most significantly for this painting on alabaster, the source appears to be Cornelis Cort’s 1575 engraving The Baptism of Christ, After Francesco Salviati. Cort’s prints can be found in several important European collections including that of the Biblioteca del Real Monasterio, a Renaissance library in Madrid.
There is further evidence of Cort’s composition acting as inspiration for Spanish artists with the painting of The Baptism of Christ by renowned Spanish artist Bartolomé Esteban Murillo in 1655. The composition of this work is more intimate and emotional, characteristics of the Baroque, but the similarities between Cort’s engraving and the alabaster painting are undeniable. Cort’s engraving depicts the scene as one of grandeur and action, with tumbling cherubim, whereas Murillo chooses to show the story as a deeply personal moment between Christ and his cousin. The alabaster painting can be seen as a bridge between these two images, embodying characteristics of both; the drama of Cort’s work and the tenderness of Murillo’s, alongside its own unique qualities.
Attribution:
Paintings on stone were a rarity in comparison to the more common mediums of wood panel and canvas, however their popularity increased throughout the late Renaissance and Baroque periods. A small but significant cadre of artists concentrated in Rome and Florence grew to be masters of the craft and none more so than Antonio Tempesta. Tempesta (1555 – 1630) was a celebrated Florentine painter and engraver who favoured dramatic landscape scenes and stories. Following his death, Tempesta was remember primarily as an engraver, but in more recent times his exceptional stone paintings have come to light and are now appreciated as some of the finest examples of the genre.
Tempesta’s work stands apart from other stone painters, not just for his skill and creativity, but for the size of his paintings and the way that he worked with and not against the natural grain of the stone, incorporating it as part of the composition. Many Renaissance and Baroque paintings on colourful stones are exquisite but small curiosities, often found as panels in part of a larger work or object. Tempesta, in contrast, painted on large singular surfaces of patterned stone, often greater than 30cm squared in size. The very nature of this work shows the esteem in which Tempesta was held by his patrons. At the time, semi-precious stones were extortionately expensive and required transporting great distances from where they were originally mined. Not only would a patron need to pay an artist for their skills, but they would also have to afford the prohibitive cost required for these most precious of materials. Sizeable paintings on stones such as alabaster could, therefore, only be commissioned by wealthiest and most powerful patrons. Tempesta’s work can be found in the collections of Europe’s most importance and cultured men, including Rudolf II’s Kunst-und Wunderkammer, Cosimo II’s Uffizi Tribuna and the treasuries of many Roman cardinals.
Perhaps the most defining quality of Tempesta’s oeuvre is the way in which he worked with the natural patterns of the stone and used them to help tell the story behind the image. Other artists would often paint a background over some or most of the stone, leaving only small amounts of the original surface visible. Tempesta chose not to work against the challenges of the material, but to embrace them. He favoured the use of alabaster as a support and in this painting, we see how the natural veins in the stone have been used to create and enhance depiction of the riverbanks, the Holy Dove and God himself. Similar examples can be found in Tempesta’s other works such as Joseph Explaining His Dream to His Brothers. Whilst The Baptism of Christ is unsigned, defining features such as the use of alabaster as a support, the large size of the painting and the way in which the natural pattern of the stone has been used, are all hallmarks of Tempesta’s work.
In Antonio Tempesta’s Paintings on Stone and the Development of a Genre in 17th-Century Italy, Johanna Beate Lohff writes:
‘A distinctive feature of his paintings on stone is the perfect integration of the stone’s patterning into the composition, which makes it almost impossible for the beholder to distinguish the boundary between Nature and Art. In comparison to the often miniature-like paintings on patterned and semiprecious stones, his paintings are fairly large. Thus, already the sheer amount of material used in combination with the actual painting made his pictures to exceptional collectors’ items.’
Origin:
With the passing of the centuries, a complete record of Tempesta’s movements no longer exists, however works by him that were created for the Spanish court remain. In 1612, Tempesta created a celebrated series of etchings depicting the life of Marguerite of Austria, the Queen Consort of King Phillip II of Spain. This series of works strongly suggests his presence in the country and the high likelihood of him having noble and ecclesiastical Spanish patrons. There are records of a growing export market of paintings from Italy to Spain as the Renaissance develops. The Convent of the Annunciation located in Salamanca, Spain, holds a little known but impressive collection of 17th Century paintings on stone. These works which now form part of the Carmelite Museum of Alba de Tormes indicate an appetite and appreciation for the unique medium of paintings on stone among the Spanish audience.