Saint Francis Stigmatta Antonio Pirri

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Saint Francis Receiving the Stigmata by Antonio Pirri (Antonio di Manfredo da Bologna)

Oil on canvas (1525)

Antonio di Manfredo da Bologna, known as Antonio Pirri, is a painter of Bolognese origin about whom very little is known. The only information known so far about him is that he was in Naples in 1511. However, his figure has been included in the works of Venturi and de Longhi, and his personality has been the subject of individual studies, such as that of Bargellesi in 1953 and that of Martini in 1961.

His catalogue of works includes several signed paintings: two in the Museo Poldi Pezzoli in Milan and another in a private collection depicting Saint Paul and Saint Anthony as hermits. Since these two oil paintings, critics have attributed other works to him, almost all of them in private collections. Among the most notable characteristics of the painter, whose activity seems to have developed in the first two decades of the 16th century, influences of Francesco Zaganelli have been detected in an initial phase, and in a second, more classical tendency, those of the Ferrarese artists Francesco Francia and Lorenzo Costa.

This painting, which came from the Italian art trade, was acquired in 1977 and attributed to Antonio Pirri. A year earlier, in 1976, Mina Gregori dated the painting to the second half of the 1520s and drew attention to the landscape that concludes the episode, in which the painter used a blue and earthy palette in which he detected Venetian elements.

Saint Francis receiving the stigmata was a popular chapter in the life of this saint born in Assisi in 1182. The son of a merchant, he abandoned the comforts offered by his family heritage to found one of the most widely followed mendicant orders. Saint Francis was canonized two years after his death, in 1228, and his biographer was Thomas of Celano. Saint Francis died at the convent of the Porziuncola, near Assisi, where he met with his disciples.

The saint's stigmatization took place in 1224, on Mount Albernia, the place where he had retired and where the vision described by Thomas of Celano took place. There, Saint Francis saw Christ on a cross with six wings floating in the air. At that moment, the wounds of Jesus Christ were reproduced on his side, hands, and feet.

Pirri reproduces that moment when Christ emits fine rays from his wounds, which imprint themselves on Saint Francis's body and produce tiny glows that indicate his injuries. The saint, kneeling, with an immutable expression, raises his gaze toward the cross. The exterior where the miraculous event takes place is organized with crags and rocky outcrops between which an idyllic river flows, leading us into the background where the buildings of a city and mountains are outlined.

The areas closest to this wild and earthy corner are populated by small animals such as rabbits, ducks, swans, storks, deer, a turtle near the river, or a snake approaching the saint, reminding us of Saint Francis's gift for animals, which became tame in his presence.

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This image is a public domain image, which means either that copyright has expired in the image or the copyright holder has waived their copyright. Franciscan Gallery charges for the access to high resolution copy of the image. Manually restoration was necessary in order to improve quality, without covering the original image.