Miraculous healings

A wide sector of the studies on the history of art has focused, and today continues to focus, on the explosive force of sacred images, which has made its mark in particular starting from the 12th-14th centuries. The fundamental role played by art in promoting the Christian faith in the populations of vast areas of Europe at that time was well-known. However, for our modern-day perception, perhaps the most interesting element is the direct emotional impact exercised on individuals by the various artistic forms. An extremely strong impact, which also influenced the ways in which people practised their faith on a daily basis, comparable – relatively speaking – to the influence of social media today. Within this universe of extraordinary impact for the audiences of that age, featuring statues and paintings that talk, shed tears or drops of blood, come to life and interact with the spectator, an absolutely unique place is occupied by the depiction of healings. Healings from physical deformities or terrible illnesses, performed first by Christ, the Virgin and the Apostles and then by an endless array of saints and blessed souls: from St Peter who heals the sick with his shadow (Acts of the Apostles V, 12-14) - “documented” forever by Masaccio on the walls of the Brancacci Chapel in Santa Maria del Carmine in Florence - to the “unexplainable” healing of Costa Rican woman Floribeth Mora Díaz in 2011, which led to the canonisation of Pope John Paul II.

The majority of the countless types of iconographies of the miraculous healings which have occurred one after the other over the centuries involve a solemn gesture or a peremptory intimation – everyone is familiar with the image and even the words of Jesus “Lazzaro, come out!” (John. 11: 43) -, but personally I have always held more admiration for the healings performed on a humbler level. For example, the one performed in total privacy by St Francis on Bartholomew of Narni, whose leg had been paralysed for many years: Giunta Pisano and other 13th century painters painted this in the scene depicted on the cuspidate altarpiece of the National Museum of St Matthew in Pisa, which came from the local church of St Francis. Here the Seraphic Father is shown supports the man’s leg, contemplating it with a look and manner that resemble those of a doctor rather than those of a holy healer! An attitude that appears to prefigure the similar and truly competent healing of the two saintly physicians Cosmas and Damiano, as they care for Justinian, deacon of the church named after them, by replacing his gangrene-ridden leg with the leg removed from the Ethiopian buried that day in the cemetery of St Peter in Vincoli. In the panel of the predella of the St Mark’s altarpiece in the San Marco Museum in Florence, Fra Angelico portrays this miracle, offering us one of the finest examples of 15th century Florentine painting: in an environment where the purest pictorial poetry of the Italian Renaissance and the extremely sharp realistic vision of the Flemish painters merge exquisitely, the two doctors truly appear to be bent over an operating table. Instead, the blessing gesture made by Saint Humility painted by Pietro Lorenzetti around 1335 in the Humility Polyptych, now in the Uffizi, appears less secular and much more spiritual: in it she heals the leg of a monk from Vallombrosa, who had refused to have it amputated.

This painting opens the variegated selection of works of the most famous Italian museum depicting the theme of miraculous healings, where the two saintly physicians reappear in the spotlight – as, it must be said, they deserve to be -, also as the protectors of the Signoria of Florence, in one of the most beautiful early works of Botticelli, the altarpiece of Sant’Ambrogio. And while more dramatic tones appear to characterise other creations (the drawings of Alessandro Allori and Francois Xavier Fabre; the canvases of Bonatti and Livio Mehus), one act of healing that is undoubtedly more intimate and almost moving, again resembling the endeavour of a doctor rather than that of a saintly healer – is the one performed by St Philip Neri on Pope Clement VIII in the painting by Pietro da Cortona. As if nullifying, finally, the thought that billions of people are today waiting for the scientific knowledge of doctors in every corner of the world to provide the most important miraculous healing of our age…a knowledge which is, in turn, one of the most wonderful miracles of Our Lord. And while we wait, all we can do is hope that artists will one day also be able to celebrate the healing of our affliction, in the not-too-distant future.

Angelo Tartuferi

Virgin and Child enthroned with saints Mary Magdalene, John the Baptist, Francis of Assisi, Catherine of Alexandria, Cosmas and Damian

1470 c.
Tempera on panel 
Uffizi Galleries, Gallery of Statues and Paintings, room 10-14, Inv. 1890 no. 8657

Of the many saints gathered in sacred conversation around the Virgin and Child, brothers Cosmas and Damian, martyrs, stand out in the foreground. They are shown kneeling in front of the throne and are identified by the name written at the bottom in capital letters. The two saints had lived in the south eastern territories of the Roman Empire in the 3rd century and were martyred under the Emperor Diocletian. They are traditionally portrayed as a pair, dressed in the red toga that distinguishes them as eminent, high-ranking characters, and specifically physicians. The red toga was worn with a matching soft red cap which St Cosmas is holding close to his chest in Botticelli’s painting. However, here they are not depicted with the instruments of the medical profession which often characterise the iconography of the two martyrs, such as ointment jars and surgical tools.

Virgin and Child enthroned with saints Mary Magdalene, John the Baptist, Francis of Assisi, Catherine of Alexandria, Cosmas and Damian

“Trained in the art of medicine, they received so much power from the Holy Spirit that they were able to heal all the illnesses of men and animals, but never wanted to be paid for their services”. This is the story told by the Golden Legend, a 13th century collection of stories about the lives of the saints which, as well as highlighting the Christian charity of the two brothers, also interprets the successful outcome of the care they administered as a manifestation of divine will. The ability to heal the sick was therefore also a very effective apostolate tool. This ability, used on a professional level, made Cosmas and Damian famous and, when called upon by the Roman authorities, they declared themselves Christians, refusing to adore idols. Sentenced to death, they miraculously escaped various attempts on their lives, until they were eventually decapitated. Due to the activities they performed, saints Cosmas and Damian have often been considered the protectors of doctors, surgeons and pharmacists since medieval times.

The Healing of Justinian by Saint Cosmas and Damian

1438-1442 c.
Tempera on panel
Florence, San Marco Museum, Inv. 1890 no. 8495

The painting illustrates a miracle performed by saintly physicians Cosmas and Damian after their martyrdom, which took place around the year 303. At the beginning of the 6th century, Pope Felice IV had had a basilica built in Rome in honour of the two martyred brothers, which has survived until today. The story goes that the church caretaker, the deacon Justinian, had a very diseased leg. One night he dreamed about the saints Cosmas and Damian who, with their instruments, a knife and some ointments, went to the cemetery of San Pietro in Vincoli to find a healthy leg to transplant on to Justinian, in place of the diseased one. The scene illustrates the two saints attaching the new leg, while Justinian sleeps. Since the corpse from which the healthy leg had been taken was that of an Ethiopian, the new limb is dark-skinned, a characteristic that makes the miracle performed visibly obvious. Upon waking, Justinian found that he had been healed and the miracle helped boost the fame of the two saintly physicians. This exceptional event, related in the Golden Legend (13th century), restores dignity to the art of surgery, which was regarded with suspicion and disgust for most of the medieval, as it was practised by amateurs and barbers. During the Renaissance, the rediscovery of Greek and Latin medical texts and the affirmation of anatomy as a scientific discipline laid the foundations for the advancement of the medical and surgical profession. The painting concluded the story of the lives of saints Cosmas and Damian illustrated by Fra Angelico in the predella of the altarpiece of the main altar in the Basilica of St Mark in Florence, commissioned by Cosimo the Elder and his brother, Lorenzo de’ Medici. The two saintly physicians, due to the assonance that linked their profession to the Medici family name, had been chosen as the protectors of the Florentine family, whose members often had their effigies depicted in the holy works they commissioned.

The three archangels

1471-1472 c.
Tempera grassa on panel 
Uffizi Galleries, Gallery of Statues and Paintings, room 15, inv. 1890 no. 8359

The three archangels are walking solemnly through a rural landscape: from left to right, Michael, wearing the armour of the warrior who had vanquished Satan, then Raphael, guardian angel of the young Tobiolo who accompanies him, and finally Gabriel, the messenger who announced the conception of the Son of God to the Virgin Mary.

The painting was hung over the altar of the brotherhood of the archangel Raphael, known as the “Raffa”, in the church of Santo Spirito in Florence. The protagonist is therefore St Raphael, who occupies the pre-eminent position in the painting, in the centre. The story of Raphael and the young Tobiolo is told in the Book of Tobit, one of the deuterocanonical books of the Christian Bible. Tobiolo was sent by his father, a blind man who had fallen on hard times, to the city of Madia to recover some money delivered to a friend. The boy set off in the company of his faithful dog and the archangel Raphael, sent by God to protect him. The archangel, instantly recognisable in the painting, had actually presented himself to Tobiolo disguised as Azarias, only revealing his true identity at the end of the journey.

The three archangels

During the journey, while they had stopped along the river Tigri, a large fish tried to bite Tobiolo’s leg. Rather than run away from it, Raphael invited the young boy to catch the fish, eat it and take its heart, liver and gall, to use as medicines. The angel taught Tobiolo to burn the heat and liver to make inhalations capable of making the demons release his future bride Sara. Upon returning home, he used the gall to heal his father’s blindness.

The three archangels

Devotion to the archangel Raphael, protector of the sick and of travellers, was particularly strong in Florence during the Renaissance, a popularity probably linked to the increase in business trips made by the young scions of the merchant class at the time. The story of Tobiolo and the archangel generated the veneration of protector angels, or guardian angels.

The author of the painting in the Uffizi, Francesco Botticini, was also particularly devoted to the archangel. A member of the “Raffa” brotherhood, he called his son Raffaello.

Healing of the man who had been blind since birth

Early 16th century
Pen and ink, paintbrush and diluted ink on paper
Uffizi, Department of Prints and drawings, Inv. 146 S

“As Jesus was passing by, He saw a man who had been blind since birth,  and His disciples asked Him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered: “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but this happened so that the works of God would be displayed in him (John 9:1-3)

John, in his Gospel, dedicated the whole of chapter 9 to the story of the man who had been blind since birth, an episode that became popular in the history of art, above all in the age of the Catholic Reformation, interpreted as an allegory of the role of the Church of Rome which, like Christ, alone can open people’s eyes to real faith. The evangelical story opens with the disciples’ question - “Who sinned?”-, which insinuates the so-called ‘theory of retribution’: if you are ill, it is because you have sinned against God and been punished as a result of your actions . Jesus demonstrates that this is not true. Here, the blind man is the man who does not ask and does not believe, first healing physically and then spiritually. The initiative originates from Jesus, who “spit on the ground, made some mud with the saliva, and put it on the blind man's eyes”, repeating the gesture of the Creation (Genesis) when God shaped man out of mud. Then Jesus sends the blind man to wash in the pool of Siloam. The context here is the festival of Sukkot (the Festival of Shelters), where the ritual required many braziers to be lit in front of the temple to generate light, and the priests to go down to the pool of Siloam to collect containers of water. Siloam means “sent”: the blind man is “sent” to the pool, in a faraway place, but he trusts Jesus, goes, and the water restores his sight. On the way back, he encounters some new problems: nobody rejoices for him. Instead he is persistently interrogated to find out the identity of his healer. Even his parents claim to know nothing about his story, perhaps out of fear: “in fact the Jews had already determined that anyone who confessed Jesus as Christ would be put out of the synagogue.” But the blind man appears unaware of his benefactor’s identity. First, he calls him “a man named Jesus”, then a Prophet. When the Pharisees throw him out, Jesus returns to him and only then does the healed blind man recognise him as the Son of God. In his Gospel, John refers to the miracles performed by Jesus as “signs” to indicate that these are not only miraculous acts but, above all, they effectively “mean” something. In the story, faith is not generated by the miracle of the healing, but by the bitter test of tribulation, solitude, and incomprehension.

Healing of the man who had been blind since birth

In the foreground, the painting shows the moment when Jesus holds out his hand towards the blind man’s eyes to spread the mud mixture on them. The blind man is kneeling down, with his head turned to Christ, and he is holding his arms open, a sign of trust and his full confidence in Christ. Jesus is tenderly leaning towards him. A line of bystanders above the two protagonists are watching what is happening, revealing a kaleidoscope of sentiments and reactions: curiosity, surprise and anger. An open hand is raised above Jesus’ healing hand, in a gesture of disapproval, almost as if intending to stop the action. The variety of expressions contaminated by the more human sentiments are contrasted by the serene profiles of Jesus and the sick man, in an exchange of understanding that goes beyond the senses. The image, albeit a sketch, is incredibly powerful. The sheet, which was donated to the graphic collection of the Uffizi in 1866 by Emilio Santarelli, bore a traditional reference to the workshop of Raphael (Santarelli/ Burci/ Rondoni 1870), which is still believed to be accurate today, since there are no new elements that might cause it to be attributed to others.

St Sebastian processional gonfalon

1525
Oil on canvas
Uffizi Galleries, Gallery of Statues anda Paintings, deposits, Inv. 1890 no.1590

Painted on both sides, in relation to the use for which the work was destined, which required it to be visible from both the front and the rear, the processional gonfalon was ordered to Sodoma in 1525 by the members of the company of St Sebastian, one of the many associations of compassion and assistance for the sick formed in the area of Porta Camollia in Siena. Traditionally, Sebastian, praetorian of the Roman army, a man of Christian faith who was sentenced to death by Diocletian, was assigned the role of protector from epidemic illnesses. For many centuries, and in particular between the 14th and 18th centuries, these illnesses repeatedly scourged the lands of Europe. The passion of the saint, who was led to the Palatine hill, tied to a tree, and shot with arrows, is defined in the iconography from the Renaissance on. In this context, Sebastian embodies an ideal of strong, youthful beauty, victorious even in the face of the most cruel torments, such as those inflicted by illnesses that were unknown and fatal in those centuries, but with which man had learned to coexist, by surrounding himself with a network of social solidarity, such as the brotherhoods.

St Sebastian processional gonfalon

Sodoma places the protagonist in the foreground, painting him in a bright light with delicate chiaroscuro shading against a background of landscape studded with ancient ruins, of the kind he had learned about in Rome, by observing the example set by Raphael and his pupils. The legend of the saint, defined by the hagiographers as “athleta Christi”, coincided - especially in Renaissance sensitivity - with the reference to a perfect, athletic body, twisted with pain and following the shape of the tree trunk to which he is bound. Sodoma, like his peers, had access to a vast range of ancient Greek and Roman statues, a never-ending supply of models and shapes that he used to pinpoint the right level of formal perfection and at the same time to personify the expression of the drama. His greatest inspiration came from the most celebrated and copied sculpture in Rome in the 16th century: Laocoön and his sons, a group of marble statues found on the Oppian Hill and immediately invested with a formidable, long-lasting iconographic popularity. The icon of the saint, weak and suffering, with tears streaming down his beautiful face as he receives the crown of martyrdom from the angel, was the first to appear to the faithful during the processions, arousing the most emotional senses of compassion and faith.
 

St Sebastian processional gonfalon

The function of the standard and its message are completed in the scene depicted on the back, a more solemn and official image, celebrating the Virgin, protector of Siena, whose glance rests on the group of devotees kneeling at the bottom of the painting. St Sigismondo and St Rocco feature in the centre of these. Joint leaders of the company, they too were among the first Christian martyrs.

St Sebastian processional gonfalon

In particular, San Rocco (Montepellier 1345/1350- Angera?, Varese 1376/79) is another figure traditionally linked to the context of the healings for his role as protector from the plague. Legend has it that Rocco, during a pilgrimage to Rome, having donated all his belongings to the poor, stopped at Acquapendente, near Viterbo, dedicating himself to aiding the sick and working miraculous healings that spread his fame far and wide. He himself caught the plague and fell ill but recovered and soon set off again on his way, continuing his charitable work. Rocco is said to have died in prison, having been arrested near Angera by some soldiers, as a suspicious person. His cult became extremely widespread throughout northern Italy, especially in Lombardy. Sodoma portrays the Saint with the walking stick of a pilgrim and the angel with the traditional attributes, while indicating on his right leg the ‘boil’, the puffy swollen mark left by the terrible black plague. The brothers of Porta Camolia are positioned alongside Sigismondo and Rocco, dressed in white tunics and hoods, dispensers of that moral and bodily comfort they felt a civic duty to administer, traces of which still survive today in the traditional Tuscan care-giving ethos.

The identifying and functional values of this work continued to be held in great esteem over time, even when the oratory was restored. In fact, the brothers refused to sell it to merchants from Lucca for a considerable sum of money, determined to preserve it in its original location. But they were helpless in the face of the request made by the Grand Duke Pietro Leopoldo, who purchased the work for the Florentine gallery in 1784.

St. Philip Neri cures Pope Clement VIII from gout

1640-42 c.
Oil on canvas
Uffizi Galleries,  Deposits, inv. Oggetti d’arte Castello no. 483

The painting, which had been believed lost, was tracked down in 1969 in the deposits of the Florentine collections, where it underwent further studies. Although, on one hand, the Medici inventories, which document its admission to the Uffizi in 1677, identify the figure of St Philip Neri, describing the scene as an episode of healing a papal figure from gout, on the other hand, they provide no information on the identity of the Pope, which has been interpreted in various ways in the past. Upon its rediscovery, the name of Clement VIII (1592-1605) was suggested, confirmed also by the appearance of the painting along with a canvas by Cristoforo Roncalli depicting a similar subject, found inside the Church of Santa Maria in Vallicella in Rome, the principal church of the Oratorian congregation, founded by St Philip Neri. In fact, the pope, born as Ippolito Aldobrandini, remembered for his attempts to reform Catholicism, his skill in foreign politics but also for his intransigence, which had led Giordano Bruno being burnt at the stake, suffered from a serious case of gout, also known as the disease of kings or popes because it was most common among the richest social classes. Not much was known about the condition and the remedies used to treat it were makeshift. Since the time of Hippocrates, it had been attributed to an immoral lifestyle and a rich diet, but this could not have been further from the truth in the case of Pope Clement, as he led a pious and extremely moral existence.

St. Philip Neri cures Pope Clement VIII from gout

The scene depicted here is not, however, simply a narrative account of the miracle of St Philip Neri which, moreover, was not even the first one he had performed during his evangelistic mission in the troubled city of 16th century Rome. In fact, Pietro da Cortona’s focus is on the intimacy of the moment and the trust with which Clement VIII is holding out his hand to “Pippo Buono” to be treated, a gesture embodying the long-standing relationship of confidence between the two, consolidated in the three year period between 1592 and 1595, between the pope’s election and the saint’s death, during which the episode of the miraculous healing from gout took place. The frankness of the discourse between the two is in fact real (it was believed that St Philip Neri’s advice was behind the pope’s reconciliation with Henry IV of France) and in turn, the intense involvement with which it is portrayed by the painter reflects Berrettini’s own close relationship with the Congregation, for which he worked several times, also creating the masterpiece of the vault of the Church of Santa Maria in Vallicella. He displayed a sensitivity to the Oratorian faith shared by various leading members of the Medici family, including Alessandro Ottaviano - direct follower of the Saint and right-hand man of Clement VIII in his policy in support of the Filipinos - and Cardinal Leopoldo, who attended the Church of Santa Maria in Vallicella. The origin of the painting is unknown, and its date is uncertain (it was painted between 1636, in analogy with the first Roman works for the Congregation and the Florentine years 1640-1642). It does, however, feature elements typical of the Tuscan culture of the period, such as its accurate description of the environment and its sense of narrative. The latter is extended in the background to include the anecdotal detail of two monks who are pulling the curtain back to witness the scene, perhaps a reference to the model of community life that has always been considered the Saint’s greatest legacy.

St Peter heals the sick with his shadow

1650 c.
Oil on canvas
Uffizi Galleries,Gallery of Statues and Paintings deposits, inv. 1890, no. 1018

“The apostles performed many signs and wonders among the people. All the believers would meet together in Solomon’s Colonnade. No one else dared join them, even though they were highly regarded by the people. Nevertheless, more and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number.

As a result, people brought the sick into the streets and laid them on beds and mats so that at least Peter’s shadow might fall on some of them as he passed by. Crowds also gathered from the towns around Jerusalem, bringing their sick and those tormented by impure spirits, and all of them were healed.” Acts (5:12-16)

The depicted episode, taken from the Book of Acts and made memorable by Masaccio’s fresco in the Brancacci Chapel in Santa Maria del Carmine in Florence, found new popularity in the iconography of the 17th century, at a time that coincided with the onset of the terrible plague epidemics that wiped out much of the population. In the painting Peter, wrapped in a yellow mantle and holding keys in his hand, is descending the stairs of the Temple portico, casting his shadow on a cripple lying prostrate at his feet, while all around him men and women are running towards him, calling for his help. In the foreground, on the left, as if framing the composition, a mother holding a smiling baby in her arms is sitting on the ground, looking towards St Peter, the radiant focus of the scene. The saint, with his proud monumental stance perfectly embodies the Apostle designated by Christ as “the rock on which I will build my Church” (Matthew 16:18). In the background, the monumental portico of the Temple of Solomon with its coffered ceiling opens up on to a striking classical-style building.

St Peter heals the sick with his shadow

The aim of the painting was to comfort the faithful by celebrating the compassionate role played by the Church during the continuous plagues. It was purchased in Paris in 1793 by Francesco Favi for the Grand Duke of Tuscany Ferdinand III, and attributed on this occasion to Laurent de la Hyre, educated Parisian artist, author of a painting with a similar subject for the cathedral of Notre Dame.

St Zenobius restores the sight of a blind man

1665 c.
Oil on canvas
Pitti Palace, Pallatine Gallery, Berenice room, Inv. Poggio Imperiale 1860 no. 1216

The parable of the beggar miraculously saved from blindness was one of the episodes of the life of St Zenobius most commonly painted by artists between the 15th and 17th centuries. Zenobius, the second bishop of Florence, who lived in the 4th century, the city’s venerated co-patron, together with Antonino, and protector of the Accademia della Crusca since 1651, was recognised, in popular Florentine tradition, as the saint who protected people from diseases. The scene illustrates the moment when the saint, on the threshold of the church where he has just finished celebrating Mass, places his hand on the blind man’s eyes, restoring his sight and earning his conversion. He therefore appears to us not only as healer, but also as evangelizer of eastern lands, according to the provisions of the hagiographic tradition. The simplicity of his gesture, the strict composure of his stance, made even more solemn by the ray of light that focuses on him from the left, are in contrast with the lively reaction of the men and women around him, from the young mother sitting on the floor to the clerics and the two children on the right. With a rapid, narrative painting style composed of touches and contrasts of colour, the painter captures the genuinely shocked, wide-eyed, almost incredulous expressions on the faces of each character, faced with the sudden manifestation of a supernatural, salvific power.

St Zenobius restores the sight of a blind man

And yet the painter’s aim was not to relate the episode with emphasis and oratory, but to express a moment of life that could easily be imagined as having taken place in the streets of Florence at the time of the painter and his clients. And indeed, the symbols of both faith and the civil pride of Florence, Brunelleschi’s dome and Giotto’s bell tower, mark the landscape in the distance, carved into the sunset, streaked with pure white clouds.

The painting is thought to have been commissioned to Flemish painter Livio Mehus by Cardinal Leopold, and to have decorated the altar of his private chapel on the second floor of Palazzo Pitti

St Charles Borromeo visiting the plague victims

1673-75
Oil on canvas 
Uffizi Galleries, Gallery of Statues and Paintings, deposits, inv. 1890 no. 1346

“Since the outbreak of the plague, St Charles had decided to fulfil all the duties a good shepherd has towards his flock and even administer the holy sacraments to them in case of need;... and obtaining the necessary things, he would pass, dressed in his pontificals, through all the districts of the city, administering it to the doors of the houses, while the people were still in quarantine... and he was able to administer the holy sacraments to many of those sick with the contagion because he passed through all the parts of the city, even where the plague was suspected to be rife [...] It seemed that everyone to whom this blessed saint appeared received the gift of life and that he removed all anguish and fear from the hearts of the poor, sick and suffering”.

This passage is taken from Gian Pietro Giusanni’s “Life of St Charles Borromeo”, published in 1610, the year in which Pope Paul V canonised the cardinal, who had died on 3 November 1584. When the terrible plague epidemic broke out in Lombardy in 1576, Borromeo, absent from Milan because he was on a pastoral visit, immediately returned, whereas the Spanish governor and the grand chancellor fled the city. In the city, the cardinal organised the aid operation, personally and tirelessly assisting all the sick until the Pope reprimanded him, worried about his health. His cult, which spread while he was still alive, grew rapidly following his death and his figure became well-known throughout Italy as many paintings, frescoes, engravings, sculpture, ephemeral apparatus, and standards depicting his image were circulated.

St Charles Borromeo visiting the plague victims

In Bonatti’s painting, St Charles Borromeo is portrayed in his pontificals while, accompanied by a cleric, he visits the victims of the plague and administers the last rites to a dying man. The epidemic that devastated Lombardy went down in history as the “plague of St Charles” and this was also remembered by Manzoni with reference to the plague of 1630: “There were only a few people who remembered to have seen [those symptoms] at the time of the plague, which, fifty-three years before, had desolated a great part of Italy, and principally the Milanese, where it was and still is known by the name of the Plague of San Carlo. It derives this appellation from the noble, beneficent, and disinterested conduct of that great man, who at length became its victim.” (The Betrothed, chapter XXXI)

The work was painted by Giovanni Bonatti between 1673 and 1675 as a “small model” for the altarpiece of the Spada chapel, dedicated to St Charles Borromeo in the church of Santa Maria in Vallicella in Rome, commissioned by Marquis Orazio Spada.

Illustrations from the book by Giovanni Angelo Lottini, Choice of several miracles and graces of the Santissima Nunziata of Florence, In Firenze appresso Pietro Cecconcelli Alle Stelle Medicee

1619
Burlin
Uffizi, Department of Prints and Drawings

The list of people who were miraculously healed after receiving the Virgin’s grace is long: from pontiff Pope Innocent VIII -”afflicted by great pains said to be intestinal” - to the less famous Lionardo of Massa di Carrara with his “crippled limbs”, who personally goes to the Church of the Santissima Annunziata and there abandons his crutches, crying “Oh, Virgin […] thanks to you, I am no longer crippled”; from the “woman withering away”, who donates a life-sized wax statue to the sanctuary when she is healed, to Margherita, the noble woman from Bologna, who receives “such a powerful, salutary collyrium” that it restores her sight. Servite Friar Giovanni Angelo Lottini, in his book of miracles dedicated to the Florentine sanctuary of the Santissima Annunziata, describes eighty miraculous events, about half of which are illustrated by engravings by Jacques Callot. The book was published for the first time in 1619, with a dedication to a very respectable devotee - the Grand Duchess Christina of Lorraine, regular attendee of the church - then republished in 1636. Callot, a Frenchman, active during those years in Florence, was in the good graces of the Medici and well-connected with the Servants of Mary: he must therefore have seemed the ideal engraver to assign the project to.

Illustrations from the book by Giovanni Angelo Lottini, Choice of several miracles and graces of the Santissima Nunziata of Florence

Image: Carlo Dolci, Annunciation (copy of the fourteenth-century painting preserved in the church of the Santissima Annunziata),  Pitti Palace, Royal and Imperial Apartments, inv. Oggetti d'arte Pitti 1911

The ex-votos were closely linked to the theme of the miraculous healings. These had the dual purpose of bearing witness to the miraculous event by handing down its memory - small panels painted with scenes of miracles - and expressing the gratitude of the person on the receiving end of the miracle towards the miracle worker. The Basilica of the Santissima Annunziata was a privileged location in Florence for the offering of votive images. The miraculous 14th century fresco of the Annunciation had always aroused great devotion, to such an extent that the uncontrollable proliferation of votive objects covering the interior of the church from floor to ceiling was a source of worry for the Servite Friars. Not only did they harbour regret for the general mess and the dust that gathered on them, but they also feared they would be the cause of accidents that might endanger the lives of the devotees, as effectively occurred in at least one case. In fact, it was not rare for artefacts, including large ones, or parts of them, gnawed at by woodworm, to fall to the ground from the beams on which they were suspended. Around 1650, Father Ferdinando Mancini counted, along with many anatomical wax elements, about six hundred life-sized statues, two thousand ex-votos in papier-mache and three thousand six hundred painted panels. 

This messy accrual of heterogeneous materials and the need to control the more excessive expressions of devotion, some of which risked degenerating into superstition, drove the Servite Friars to take action to bring the spontaneous and visceral devotion of the Florentine people back into the spirit of the Counter-Reformation. In this way, from the end of the 16th century, they had already engaged a group of artists, including characters such as Antonio Tempesta, Matteo Rosselli, Giovanni Bilivert - some of whom were also the inventors of the figurations in Callot’s engravings - in the execution of the so-called canvases of “ex-voto memory”. These were thirty-three votive paintings that featured the main miracles of the Annunciation according to the dictates of the Church rather than the imagination of amateur painters.

Illustrations from the book by Giovanni Angelo Lottini, Choice of several miracles and graces of the Santissima Nunziata of Florence

To Pope Innocent VIII, who was thought to / be nearing the end of his life, has the risk of death removed / by MARY

Margherita, noblewoman from Bologna, who had been / blind for a long time, comes miraculously to the VIRGIN ANNUNCIATE / and has her sight restored, by Matteo Rosselli

Burlin
Uffizi Gallery, Department of Prints and Drawings, inv. 96191 e 96204

This same cultural programme also spawned Lottini’s book of miracles, which preserves the memory of miraculous events spanning from 1252 to 1612, protecting them from the risk of being forgotten linked to the precarious conservation of painted panels or wax statues. The aim of the project was to boost the reputation of the sanctuary outside Florence through a work that was easy to disseminate, sustained by the ease of disseminating engravings that were expertly executed and featured clear contents. The volume was exceptionally popular. It was circulated in various countries beyond Italy, once and for establishing a code for the representation of some of the miracles of the Santissima Annunziata.

Illustrations from the book by Giovanni Angelo Lottini, Choice of several miracles and graces of the Santissima Nunziata of Florence

Lionardo, in the Chapel of the VIRGIN ANNUNCIATE where/ he had gone to pray and make an offering, is immediately healed:/from crippling, by Matteo Rosselli

For a woman who is withering away, suffering from a sickness / without cure, help is sought from the VIRGIN ANNUNCIATE and she is cured, by Giovanni Bilivert

Burlin
Uffizi Gallery, Department of Prints and Drawings, inv. nn. 96207and  96194

Christ healing the sick (“The hundred florin print”)

1647-49
Etching, drypoint, burlin
Uffizi, Department of Prints and Drawings, inv. no. 6056 st sc

“Jesus left Galilee and went into the region of Judea to the other side of the Jordan. Large crowds followed Him, and He healed them there”, Matthew 19:1-2

Jesus is the ultimate miraculous, salvific figure, presented here according to the evangelical story of Matthew. Rembrandt joins together different episodes in a single scene, squaring them up against a personal and organic endeavour of interpretation. The result is one of his most famous engravings, which touches on the theme of healing people from sickness and of the purity of the soul - “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to beings such as these” (Matthew 19:14).

The various gestures and different expressions of the depicted characters are surprising: a destitute humanity all keeping toa precise layout in relation to the figure of Christ: the sick are on his right, near his blessing hand and the children, accompanied by their mothers, are running in from the left, towards his receiving hand. A group of sceptical Pharisees (“Then some Pharisees came to him to test him.”, Matthew 19:3) opens the scene on the left and a camel closes it on the right in the background (“… it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God”, Mt 19:23).

The mixed technique used by Rembrandt in this work distinguishes the artist as an exceptional experimenter. Indeed, to make the printing plate, he juxtaposed acid engraving (etching) with precise, cutting direct burlin engraving, and the drypoint technique, using a metallic etching needle that yields a soft, velvety stroke. Only in this way could he achieve the deep blacks of the most impenetrable obscurity, counterposed with the blinding divine light obtained with the white of the paper. Christ is located in the centre, in the crucial point, where the contrast between light and shadow is the strongest. Between these two extremes, the sophisticated variations in the shades of grey add depth to the scene. Simple outlines trace the characters swathed in the light – such as the figure who appears to be the young rich guest invited in vain by Jesus to sell his possessions and follow him (Matthew 19:22), to whom the figure of the camel also refers – whereas dense parallel and crossed over outlines are used in the figures partially or fully visible in the shadow.

The large engraving is commonly known as “The thousand florin print”, probably a reference to its sale price. The sources also relate an anecdote according to which Rembrandt, who wanted to buy some prints belonging to Marcantonio Raimondi worth that same amount, is said to have bartered for them with a copy of this work.

Jesus restores a blind man’s sight

Beginning of the XIX century
Pen and bistre on white paper
Uffizi, Department of Prints and Drawings, inv. no. 11820 S

“And they came to Jericho. And as he went out of Jericho with his disciples and a great number of people, blind Bartimaeus, the son of Timaeus, sat by the highway side begging. And when he heard that it was Jesus of Nazareth, he began to cry out, and say: “Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me!” And many charged him that he should hold his peace: but he cried out louder: “Thou son of David, have mercy on me!” And Jesus stopped, and said: “Call him!” And they called the blind man, saying unto him, Be of good comfort! Rise; he calleth thee!” And he, casting away his garment, rose, and came to Jesus. And Jesus said unto him: “What wilt thou that I should do unto thee?”. The blind man said unto him: “Lord, that I might receive my sight!”. And Jesus said unto him: “Go thy way; thy faith hath made thee whole”. And immediately he received his sight and followed Jesus along the way. [Mark 10: 46-52.]

The setting of Fabre’s drawing, with the crowd at the gates of a fortified city, and the detail of the cloak left near the well, suggest that it depicts the healing of the blind man named Bartimaeus and not the man who had been blind since birth, whose story is related in the Gospel of John, the depictions of which are often confused.

The last healing performed by Christ, which is also present in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, occurs at the gates of Jericho, at a moment in time between the resurrection of Lazarus and Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem. Here the blind man is a believer who specifically asks to be cured: he immediately recognises Jesus as the Saviour of Israel and shouts at him “Son of David”. Then, asking him to restore his sight, he calls on him using the intimate title “Lord”, which means “my master” or “my great one”, a superior epithet to “rabbi” or “master”, also used by the enemies of Jesus. Bartimaeus manifests his faith, before Jesus meets his fate in Jerusalem. “Your faith has saved you”, he tells him and Bartimaeus, his sight restored, follows him.

Jesus restores a blind man’s sight

François-Xavier Fabre, the author of the drawing, was Jacques-Louis David’s best pupil in Paris, and he lived in Florence for over thirty years (1793-1824). There he met the city’s two most renowned characters: famous tragic poet Vittorio Alfieri and his companion, Louise of Stolberg, countess of Albany, "queen" of a brilliant literary and artistic salon that enabled Fabre to quickly enter the foreigners’ circles in Florence until he became her favourite painter. Historical, landscape and fine portrait painter of the cosmopolitan European society (the popular portraits of Alfieri and Foscolo were his), Fabre also tried his hand at painting holy subjects.

The drawing stands out for the dynamism of the characters’ poses and gestures, highlighted by the painter’s swift brush stroke and half shades. The lively atmosphere of the main scene is contrasted by the extensive setting of the imposing wall, beyond which the city looms. The technique shows the full expressive maturity of the painter, who in 1801 was appointed official court portrait painter in the interlude of the Kingdom of Etruria.

St Sebastian healed by the pious women

1803-1804 c.
Uffizi, Depaartment of Prints and Drawings, inv. no. 109583

Pietro Benvenuti (1769-1844) was a very precocious, talented painter who, after training at the Accademia in Florence, went to Rome, where he stayed for many years (1792-1804). And indeed, between the 18th and 19th centuries, Rome was a place where promising young artists would go to study the works of antiquity and become inspired to express the beauty and magniloquence that became the code of neoclassical art.

In this scene, the theatrical nature of the poses is reminiscent of one of the grand epigones of Neoclassicism, French painter Jacques-Louis David, who influenced the young Benvenuti and who, in Rome, had in turn been influenced not only by ancient art, but also by 17th century Italian art. The accurate details and the finiteness of the forms are indications of the painter’s highly meticulous, careful style, which he had inherited from the Tuscan painting tradition. The squared piece of paper was probably a preparatory sketch for a large painting created around 1803/1804 for the marquis Albergotti of Arezzo, now lost.

In Tuscany, Pietro Benvenuti was a very successful painter, working for the court of Elisa Baciocchi and then for the court of the Lorraine family after the end of the Napoleonic era: one of his most important commissions was the decoration of the Hercules Room on the first floor of Palazzo Pitti (1817-1829).

Sebastian was a praetorian who lived in the 3rd century AD. Having been born to Christian parents, he entered the personal guard of the emperors Maximian and Diocletian and began offering comfort to the prisoners sentenced to death. Thanks to his position he was able to have many of them released. Diocletian, who came to know of Sebastian’s faith, sentenced him to death and ordered that he be shot with arrows. His lifeless body was recovered by Irene, widow of a martyred imperial officer who, with the aid of her servant, intended to give him a worthy burial. But despite his torment, the young man was still alive, and Irene healed his wounds with great care and dedication.

As soon as he was able, Sebastian presented himself to the emperor, accusing him of unfair cruelty towards Christians: this led to Diocletian’s decision to have him flogged to death and have his body thrown into the Cloaca Maxima, so that it could not be recovered and buried. But Sebastian appeared in a dream to the Roman matron Lucina, indicating the location of his body, which was then recovered and buried in the catacombs on the Appian Way alongside saints Peter and Paul. The pilgrims visiting the apostles’ tombs would also find that of the praetorian, whose cult soon became very popular. In the 4th century, a basilica dedicated to Saints Peter and Paul was built.

When Rome was struck, in 680, by a terrible plague, prayers were addressed to St Sebastian, who was believed to have been responsible for ending the epidemic. The basilica that conserved his relics became known by everyone as “Basilica Sancti Sebastiani”.

St Sebastian healed by the pious women

In traditional hagiography and its pictorial representation, the wounds caused by arrows were compared to the buboes of the plague and, from the Roman plague in 680, to those that occurred a thousand years later, the saint was venerated as protector from epidemics: people would invoke his intercession and protection with prayer, building churches and commissioning works of art dedicated to him. Over the centuries, portraying martyrdom by arrow wounds became an opportunity to depict a beautiful, young strong body suffering torture, with melancholic gaze raised towards the sky, while awaiting the palm of martyrdom.

San Sebastiano

1943
Oil on canvas,
Palazzo Pitti, Modern Art Gallery, deposits, inv. Giornale 5563

Giovanni Colacicchi painted his St Sebastian in 1943 when, evacuated with his family to Vallombrosa, he was a guest at the Casa al Dono of art historian Bernard Berenson. Today, the memory of those modelling sessions is kept alive by a photograph of the set in Berenson’s studio and the story of its creation related by Flavia Arlotta, the artist’s wife. Arlotta remembered how the model, Guido Fabiani, tied to a tree trunk with a sawn tree stump under his feet, despite the apparent discomfort caused by the position, would often tend to doze off, and of how instead, one day, a friend, finding the house empty, had been very frightened, believing that he was being tortured. On the other hand, those were dark times: soldiers and fleeing Jews would pass through Casa al Dono and Colacicchi, refined painter and professor at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence, could not help but reflect, together with Berenson, on the role played by beauty and culture in the face of the drama of the war. The subject he chose was Saint Sebastian, the ultimate saint of healings, who had miraculously survived the arrows of martyrdom thanks to Irene’s care, and had in turn been elevated to the level of martyr of the cult and protector from the plague. The origins of his healing powers were uncertain, but they were developed, above all, following the epidemics that had broken out in Rome and Pavia in the 7th century, which had miraculously been stopped by the invocation of the Saint. Colacicchi’s choice was not so much driven by the desire to portray a wonder but more by the possibility of trying his hand at creating that canon of ideal beauty that had characterised the iconography of St Sebastian since the Renaissance. Colacicchi would perhaps have had time to think about this during his studies, printed in that same year, 1943, on Antonio del Pollaiolo, author, together with his brother Piero, of a famous version of the martyrdom, today preserved in the National Gallery of London. However, the artist chose not to use the typified element of the arrows strongly rooted in the hagiographic tale of the 5th century, which described the martyr as pierced by so many arrows that “he resembled a hedgehog”.

San Sebastiano

Here, nothing violated the beauty of the body presented by Colacicchi, intensified by the raking light that arrives from the left, languid and and sensual in line with the modern reinterpretation activated in 1911 by Gabriele D’Annunzio’s Le martyre de Saint Sébastien. In D’Annunzio’s work, the young body of the Saint, brought on to the scene by Ida Rubinstein, embodies human perfection, of both the aesthetic and moral kinds. Colacicchi would also subsequently feel the need to strip the painting bare of its religious value. In fact, he would name it Man tied up, thinking back, as Flavia Arlotta would write, “about what was happening around us while he was painting it, and about the partisans”. Dark times indeed, also obscured in the thick Vallombrosian pine wood of the background (so different from his usual tributes to the “Sun God”) but contrasted by the artist’s perceptions of the spirit and of beauty as intangible.