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Above the left door Antonio Alberti (1603-1649), Cardinal Antonio Barberini’s portait Oil painting, cm. 280x200 Alberti made the two portraits (Urbano VIII Barberini – above the right door – and his brother, the cardinal Antonio), between 1631 and 1633. These portraits are influenced by the Roman school of portraits of the Twenties and the Thirties, imposed by the painters Reni and Domenichino. We can remark some dryness in execution, but also the character’s psychological definition, that is evident mainly in the cardinal’s portrait. The painter portrayed him while seated, holding the four-pointed cap in his left hand and the right one leaning on the chair’s arm to rest. In the panel on his left from a balcony we can see the church and a part of the convent he had built; on his left, leaning from the table, the plan of the building signed at the bottom by the architect, friar Michele da Bergamo |
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Two on the right and two on the left The four Evangelists They were given the capuchins by Giacomo Domenichini from Bologna by a notarial act on august 1st 1642. According to this act, the authors are all from Bologna: St. John painted by Lionello Spada (1572-1622), St. Luke by Lucio Massari (1569-1633), St. Mark by Alessandro Tiarini (1577-1668), St. Matthew by Guido Reni (1575-1642); anyway not all critics agree about this last attribution. The character of St. Matthew (the second one from the right) shows clear references to Michelangelo in the “plebeian” attitude: the diagonal given by the shoulders, the vigorously senile head and the arm stretched to write is accentuated by the bright reflexes on the roll. The character issues an authority that seems to submit even the angel more as a collaborator than as a souce of inspiration. |
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Left wall, at the bottom
Girolamo Siciolante da Sermoneta (1521-1575), Virgin’s Annunciation Oil painting on table, cm. 270x182 The work is signed by the author, dated 1571; in a letter of 1571 the author writes Bonifacio Caetani that the capuchins (probably the ones of “San Bonaventura al Quirinale” convent) did not want it because it was “too sumptuous” and “they want another one, cheaper and simpler, because they say their religion does not seek for so much sumptuousness”. Originally, it was in the third chapel, on the right, where now there is the painting by Domenichino. The Virgin and the Archangel are painted within a domestic environment, where a glimpse of a city at the sunset can be seen through a door. God the Father lights the scene from the heaven among a crowd of angels, together with the dove of the Holy Ghost. The puttoes are made with no formal scheme and, unless the part has been re-painted, certainly it was not made by Siciolante. The perspective is frontal, underlined by the floor’s lines converging towards the bottom. |
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Right wall, at the bottom Marco Pino da Siena
(1525c. - 1586), Noli me tangere Oil painting on table, cm. 200x160 The painting, which was attributed to Siciolante up to 1966, presents some unusual features for his works: the colour quality is not typical of this painter; in fact it is not a feature of the Author the use of blue and pale violet in cloths, as well as of deep brown and green in landscapes. The facial features, with the heavy eyebrows, the very wide eyes, the full lower lips and the emotional expressions do not remind Siciolante, but the works by Marco Pino in Santa Maria in Ara Coeli. Even the landscape, always important in the works by Siciolante is of a lesser importance here. The movement of the arms is interesting, they cross by bending, as the Risen Christ’s whole body, without meeting, even if Christ’s gesture shows a kind of tenderness |
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Altar-piece Terenzio Terenzi (+1621), The Virgin in a circle of clouds and angels has her eyes lowered towards the half-circle of Saints and devotees: St. Michael (Michele Peretti, prince of Venafro), St. Margaret (the princess Margherita Peretti), St. Francis presenting her the child Francesco Peretti Montalto, St. Bonaventura. The painting, perhaps commissioned by Cardinal Alessandro Peretti Montalto in 1606, as an altar-piece of the old St. Bonaventura’s Convent, was later transported here “with all its ornament made in walnut with two columns” on the basis of which the coat-of-arms is carved Vergine, in un cerchio di nuvole e di angeli, ha gli occhi chinati vero il semicerchio dei santi e dei devoti: san Michele (Michele Peretti, principe di Venafro), santa Margherita (la principessa Margherita in Peretti), |
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Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (?) (1571-1610), The work’s attribution to Caravaggio is being discussed by art critics. The painting was brought here from the previous convent of “St. Bonaventura al Quirinale), perhaps painted in 1603. The face is portrayed in placid contemplation of “sister death”, as St. Francis called her, holding a skull in his hands, almost tenderly. The essentiality of nature and objects – the cross, the skull and a clover drown down – underlines the character’s absolute interiority, powerfully struck by flashes of light making it emerge from total darkness. The mended cloth and the raw rock are typical of the spirit of poorness characterizing the capuchins for whom the painting was made. |
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