Saint Ansanus Baptizes the People of Siena

Ansanus, one of the patron saints of Siena, came from a noble Roman family. For his missionary activity he suffered martyrdom near Siena in 304. His local cult gained new impetus from 1107, when his body was brought to the city. The painting belonged to a predella illustrating the legend of Saint Ansanus. The panel depicting the saint’s beheading is preserved in the Museo Nazionale in Florence, in the Carrand Collection. The scene takes place in the foreground on pale green ground, with a pink city wall in the background, decorated with the black-and-white coat of arms of Siena. Ansanus’s frail, ascetic body is covered by a loose tunic and toga. With his thin legs barely seeming to touch the ground, he steps forward to baptise the kneeling figures before him with water symbolising the new faith. The “illogical” foreshortening of the tub standing behind him is in itself proof that, for Giovanni di Paolo, emphasising the sacred significance of the figures and objects represented was far more important than applying the achievements of spatial representation. The faces of the neophytes undressing before the city gate bear an expression of pain — even their locks of hair twist restlessly — and an originally prosaic, everyday action is transformed, through its broken-rhythm choreography, into a true rite. The overall suggestive power of the painting owes much to the stronger tones of blue, orange-yellow, green and red, set against the paler colours of the background. Vilmos Tátrai, 1993

Provenance

Arnold Ipolyi’s Purchase from the Ramboux estate in Cologne, 1867

Exhibitions

• 1930 Budapest, Műcsarnok "Őszi kiállítás"
• 1971 Budapest, Szépművészeti Múzeum " A középkor alkonya"

Bibliography

• Sallay, Dóra: Corpus of Sienese Paintings in Hungary, 1420–1510. Florence, Centro Di, 2015. kat. 9, 128-135
• Cséfalvay Pál, szerk.: Keresztény Múzeum, Esztergom. Budapest, 1993. 226-227, kat. sz. 93. (Tátrai Vilmos)
• Christie's Review of the Season 1979. Edited by John Herbert. Studio Vista. London, 1979. 21. TV
• Mucsi András: Az esztergomi Keresztény Múzeum Régi Képtárának katalógusa. Budapest, 1975, 41;
• Szent Ansanus címszó In: Lexikon dér Christlichen Ikonographie. V. kötet. Rom-Freiburg-Basel'Wien, 1973. 193-194;
• Mucsi András: Gótikus és reneszánsz táblaképek az esztergomi Keresztény Múzeumban. Esztergom, 1973. 15;
• Boskovits 1968, 17. képleírás;
• Berenson 1968, 177;
• Boskovits-Mojzer-Mucsi 1967, 50;
• Boskovits Miklós-Mojzer Miklós-Mucsi András: Az esztergomi Keresztény Múzeum képtára. Budapest, 1964. , 56-58;