Christ as the Man of Sorrows
Naddo Ceccarelli (active around 1320/30–47)
c. 1347
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Towards the end of the thirteenth century and in the first half of the fourteenth, the local school of painting in Siena was absolutely the equal of its counterpart in Florence, and the former’s leader, Duccio di Buoninsegna, was certainly a match for the latter’s, Giotto. The subsequent evolution of Italian and even European art has had the consequence that Siena tends to be viewed as a backwater, but that does not affect the artistic quality of its finest achievements.
Naddo Ceccarelli (or Ceccharelli) is by no means the best known of the generation after Duccio, and the number of works that may be associated with his name is fewer than twenty, of which the present panel – and a less well preserved ‘Madonna and Child’ (private collection) of almost identical dimensions and overall design, again with eight busts of holy personages in roundels adorning an integral frame – are unquestionably the most distinguished. Taken in combination, they have also preserved their artist’s identity, since the ‘Christ’ is signed ‘NADDVS CECCH[ARELLI] DESENIS MEPINX[IT]’ (Naddo Ceccarelli of Siena painted me), while the Virgin is identically signed but in addition dated 1347, the year before the disaster of the Black Death. For the rest, both works reveal a significant debt to Simone Martini, but the larger picture of Naddo’s development is not easily established.
The present work, which is a symbolic representation of a type customarily referred to as an ‘Imago Pietatis’, shows the dead Christ, still wearing the Crown of Thorns, and marked with the wounds of the Crucifixion in his hands and side, standing up miraculously unsupported in the tomb, over which his splendid purple and gold-starred robe is spread. The frailty of his bloodless, hunched body and the pathos of his facial expression were intended to convey the pain and suffering experienced by the God made Man.
- Material/technique
- Tempera and gold on panel
- Measurements
- 71 × 50 cm
- Acquisition
- acquired in 1892 by Prince Johann II von Liechtenstein
- Currently exhibited
- Garden Palace, permanent presentation
- Artists/makers/authors
- Naddo Ceccarelli
- Inventory number
- GE 862
- Signature/inscriptions content only available in German
- Sign. unten: NADDUS CECCH(ARELLI) DESENIS MEPINX(IT)
- Provenance
- acquired in 1892 by Prince Johann II von Liechtenstein
- Iconography
- Christ in misery (Herrgottsruh)
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