Portrait of Alof de Wignacourt and his Page
Portrait of Alof de Wignacourt | |
---|---|
Italian: Ritratto di Wignacourt con paggio | |
![]() | |
Artist | Caravaggio |
Year | 1607–1608 |
Medium | Oil on canvas |
Dimensions | 195 cm × 134 cm (77 in × 53 in) |
Location | Louvre, Paris |
Portrait of Alof de Wignacourt with his Page (c. 1607-1608) is a painting by the Italian master Caravaggio, in the Louvre of Paris.
Alof de Wignacourt joined the Order of the Knights of Saint John (the Knights of Malta) in 1564, aged seventeen, and distinguished himself the next year at the Great Siege of Malta, when the Turks were defeated and never returned to the island. He was elected Grand Master in 1601, determined to enhance the prestige of the Order and its new post-siege capital, Valletta. It was not surprising, therefore, that he would welcome the opportunity to have at his court the most famous painter in Rome and Naples, Michelangelo da Caravaggio.
Caravaggio arrived in Malta from Naples in July 1607 and according to his early biographers Giovanni Baglione and Giovanni Bellori, he began at once with portraits of Wignacourt and other knights from the highest ranks of the Order. This famous portrait shows the Grand Master in formal armour, holding his baton of command, every gleaming inch an image of the military might of the Knights. At the time Wignacourt was about sixty years old. He had strengthened the fortifications of the island, built an aqueduct to guarantee water to the city, and launched several attacks on the Turks. He had turned the Knights into a sovereign power, making himself in effect a prince answerable to no-one except the Pope, with his own increasingly wealthy court.
One of his innovations had been to surround to himself with young pages, in imitation of the fashion of the princely courts. The pages were taken from the most noble Catholic families of Europe. According to John Gash and others the page in the portrait is probably Nicholas de Paris Boissy, a French aristocrat destined for a distinguished career – he became Grand Prior of France in 1657. He is placed a little awkwardly within the composition: his feet are aligned with the feet of de Wignacourt, as if standing beside de Wignacourt, but his hand and the helmet overlap Wignacourt's elbow, giving the impression that from the waist up he is in front of the knight. The fact can be explained by Caravaggio's practice of painting separately from live models – de Wignacourt and the page were apparently not together in the studio at the same time.
The boy's lively expression and alert gaze make him an attractive subject in his own right, to the extent that he was several times copied by later artists visiting Malta. Wignacourt, encased in splendid black and gold Milanese armour, stares upwards and outwards out of the frame in a dignified manner that invites the viewer to gaze upon him in awe, leaving the page, with his look of boyish interest, as the sole thoroughly human presence, and a far more sympathetic one than the self-conscious man of steel. The double-portrait with the pageboy was an unusual combination for the time. It may have been ordered by Wignacourt to stress the dignity of his court, or Caravaggio may have been inspired by a painting by Titian that he could have seen in his youth in Milan, Alfonso d'Avalos Addressing his Troops, showing the Spanish governor of the city addressing his knights with a page beside him holding his helmet.
See also
Sources
- Sammut, E. (1949). "Caravaggio in Malta" (PDF). Scientia. 15 (2): 78–89.
- Gash, John (2004). Caravaggio. Chaucer. ISBN 1-904449-22-0.
- Giorgi, Rosa (1999). Caravaggio: Master of light and dark - his life in paintings. Dorling Kindersley. ISBN 0-7894-4138-1.
- Langdon, Helen (1998). Caravaggio: A Life. Farrar, Straus and Giroux. ISBN 0-374-11894-9.
- Robb, Peter (1998). M. Macmillan. ISBN 0-312-27474-2.
References
External links
Media related to Portrait of Alof de Wignacourt by Caravaggio at Wikimedia Commons
- v
- t
- e
- Boy Peeling Fruit (c. 1592)
- Young Sick Bacchus (c. 1593)
- Boy with a Basket of Fruit (c. 1593)
- Boy Bitten by a Crayfish (c. 1593; lost)
- The Fortune Teller (c. 1594)
- The Cardsharps (c. 1594)
Del Monte paintings
- The Musicians (c. 1595)
- Saint Francis of Assisi in Ecstasy (c. 1595)
- Boy Bitten by a Lizard (c. 1596)
- The Lute Player (c. 1596)
- Bacchus (c. 1596)
- Penitent Magdalene (c. 1597)
- Rest on the Flight into Egypt (c. 1597)
- Medusa (c. 1597)
- Portrait of a Courtesan (Fillide Melandroni) (c. 1597)
- Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto (c. 1597)
- Saint Catherine of Alexandria (c. 1598)
- The Sacrifice of Isaac (Princeton; c. 1598)
- John the Baptist (c. 1598)
- Martha and Mary Magdalene (c. 1598)
- Portrait of Maffeo Barberini (1598)
- Basket of Fruit (c. 1599)
- Judith Beheading Holofernes (c. 1599)
- David and Goliath (c. 1599)
- Narcissus (c. 1599)
Most famous
painter in Rome
- The Calling of Saint Matthew (1599–1600)
- The Martyrdom of Saint Matthew (1599–1600)
- The Conversion of Saint Paul (1600)
- The Crucifixion of Saint Peter (1601)
- The Conversion of Saint Paul on the Road to Damascus (1601)
- Supper at Emmaus (London; 1601)
- Amor Victorious (1602)
- Saint Matthew and the Angel (1602; destroyed)
- The Inspiration of Saint Matthew (1602)
- The Incredulity of Saint Thomas (c. 1602)
- The Taking of Christ (1602)
- The Entombment of Christ (c. 1603)
- Saint Francis in Prayer (c. 1603)
- The Calling of Saints Peter and Andrew (c. 1603–1606)
- Madonna of Loreto (Madonna dei Pellegrini, Pilgrims' Madonna) (c. 1604)
- The Crowning with Thorns (Prato; 1604)
- The Death of the Virgin (1604)
- Christ on the Mount of Olives (1605)
- Ecce Homo (Genoa; c. 1605)
- Saint Jerome in Meditation (c. 1605)
- Saint Jerome Writing (Rome; c. 1605)
- Portrait of Pope Paul V (1605)
- Still Life with Fruit (1605)
- Madonna and Child with Saint Anne (Dei Palafrenieri) (1606)
Naples and Malta
- Ecce Homo (Madrid; c. 1605–1609)
- Mary Magdalen in Ecstasy (1606)
- Saint Francis in Meditation (1606)
- Supper at Emmaus (Milan; 1606)
- The Seven Works of Mercy (1606)
- The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew (1607)
- David with the Head of Goliath (Vienna; 1607)
- Madonna of the Rosary (1607)
- The Crowning with Thorns (Vienna; 1607)
- The Flagellation of Christ (c. 1607)
- Christ at the Column (c. 1607)
- Salome with the Head of John the Baptist (London; c. 1607)
- Saint Jerome Writing (Valletta; 1607)
- Portrait of Alof de Wignacourt and his Page (1607–1608)
- Portrait of Fra Antonio Martelli (1608)
- The Beheading of Saint John the Baptist (1608)
- Sleeping Cupid (1608)
Sicily and Naples
- The Annunciation (1608)
- The Burial of Saint Lucy (1608)
- The Raising of Lazarus (1609)
- Adoration of the Shepherds (1609)
- Nativity with Saint Francis and Saint Lawrence (1609; lost)
- Salome with the Head of John the Baptist (Madrid; 1609)
- Denial of Saint Peter (1610)
- The Martyrdom of Saint Ursula (1610)
- David with the Head of Goliath (Rome; 1610)
- Paintings attributed to Caravaggio
- Utrecht Caravaggism
- Caravaggisti
- Caravaggio, il pittore maledetto
- Caravaggio (1986 film)
- Caravaggio (2007 film)
- Caravaggio's Shadow