Saint Francis El Greco
This oil painting "Ecstasy of St. Francis of Assisi" is attributed to the Spanish painter of Greek descent, Dominikos Theotokopoulos, known as El Greco. It was discovered in 1964 in Kosów Lacki by Izabella Galicka and Hanna Sygietyńska-Kwoczyńska. It is housed in the collection of the Diocesan Museum in Siedlce.
Saint Francis is depicted at the moment he receives the stigmata. He is shown from the knees up, leaning forward, facing three-quarters toward a bright light emanating from the left. Gazing at the sky, he has tears in his eyes. His figure is unnaturally elongated, with his arms outstretched in a gesture of surrender to God. His robe consists of a monk's habit with wide, pleated sleeves and a hooded collar, fastened with a double rope tied in a knot. In the background, the outline of the La Verna mountain is visible. Beneath his right hand, there is a skull – an attribute of vanity. The color palette of the painting is described as cold. This composition, with its radiant light and unusual coloring, portrays Saint Francis in an ecstatic, deeply spiritual manner.
The artist included two light sources in the painting: the first strongly illuminates the figure of Saint Francis, while the second emanates from a cloud just before his face.
In the mid-1970s, Polish cardiologist Professor Jan Kwoczyński noted a strong resemblance between the figure of Saint Francis and one of the shepherds in the paintings Adoration of the Shepherds by Jacopo Bassano and Francesco Bassano the Younger, which were created around the same period. This resemblance could suggest that the same person posed for all three paintings, also maching the typically elongated appearance of figures in El Greco's works.
In 1964, Izabella Galicka and Hanna Sygietyńska-Kwoczyńska, researchers from the Polish Academy of Sciences' Institute of Art, discovered the painting hanging on the wall of the parish house of the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Kosów Lacki while conducting an inventory of the art monuments of the Sokołów County.
The following year, they described the painting in Katalog zabytków sztuki w Polsce (Catalog of Art Monuments in Poland), attributing it to the workshop of El Greco.
On 5 May 1966, a documentary about the painting was made for the Polish Film Chronicle and broadcast on May 17 under the title Is It the Real El Greco?.
An article about the discovery of the El Greco painting was published in early March 1967 in Biuletyn Historii Sztuki, in issues from 3 to 4, under the title The Unknown Painting in Kosów from El Greco's Franciscan Series. Information about the discovery appeared in the press three weeks later, on April 1, initially in three newspapers: on the front page of Trybuna Ludu, in Słowo Powszechne, and in Dziennik Bałtycki. Some other periodicals dismissed the articles as an April Fools' joke.
At that time, the painting was officially owned by Canon Władysław Stępień, the parish priest of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary Church in Kosów Lacki, which reduced the risk of its confiscation by the state, for example, in case of parish debts. On 1 June 1967, the painting was initially examined by Professor Bohdan Marconi and later had its paint layer analyzed by Piotr Rudniewski, who revealed significant overpainting in the upper corner of the artwork. Shortly before his death, Father Stępień made a will, in which he bequeathed the painting to the parish of Kosów.
After his death on 5 February 1968, the painting was almost immediately removed from his room by Bishop Wacław Skomorucha and secretly transported to the diocesan curia in Siedlce. On 14 February 1968, after several articles in the press speculated about the painting's fate, church authorities notified the Presidium of the Voivodeship National Council's Department of Culture in Warsaw, the Institute of Art, and the regional conservator of monuments about the actual location of the painting.
On 23 November 1973, the bishop of Siedlce, Jan Mazur, made the decision to conserve the painting. In 1974, various studies (including microchemical, X-ray, and spectrographic analyses) and conservation work were carried out at the Conservation Laboratory in Warsaw. These were performed by Zofia Marconi-Blizińska and Maria Orthwein under the supervision of Professor Bohdan Marconi.
On 13 January 1974, Piotr Rudniewski informed Izabella Galicka and Hanna Sygietyńska that during the examination of the lower part of the painting, an authentic signature of El Greco – Domenikos Theotokopoulos – written in Greek minuscule, was discovered under the false overpainting of the signature A. van Dück.
Based on this discovery, and considering the results of all the studies, a three-person commission from the Ministry of Culture and Art, appointed by Minister Józef Tejchma, confirmed on 30 September 1974 that the painting was indeed an original work of El Greco.
At that time, Ecstasy of St. Francis of Assisi was recognized as one of the six most valuable paintings in Poland. Later, the painting returned to the diocesan curia in Siedlce, from where it was transferred to the Diocesan Museum in 2004. For many years, it was not publicly displayed for security reasons.
In the 1970s, Bishop Jan Mazur was questioned by officers of the Security Service about the painting and its storage conditions. Some individuals also proposed purchasing the artwork.
On 1 March 1990, Professor Aleksander Gieysztor, then director of the Royal Castle in Warsaw, requested the loan of the painting for an exhibition in the Royal Chapel between November 5 and December 2 to commemorate the 450th anniversary of El Greco's birth. The request was declined by Bishop Mazur and the diocesan conservator of monuments, Father Tadeusz Kulik, who justified their refusal by citing the Code of Canon Law (canon 1292, § 2).
Since 15 October 2004, Ecstasy of St. Francis of Assisi has been on permanent display at the Diocesan Museum in Siedlce. This became possible only after the building was adapted to display such a valuable painting, with the costs of adaptation and security systems covered by sponsors.
Between June 6 and 18 November 2016, the painting underwent thorough conservation, carried out at the National Museum in Kraków by a team led by chief conservator Janusz Czop. The conservation work included pressing on a backing table, filling in areas where the plaster was missing, remounting the canvas on a new wooden stretcher, varnishing, and retouching the paint layer. The edges of the canvas were uncovered and straightened, which increased the painting's size by 4 cm (width) and 2 cm (height). A false stigma on the habit, which had been added with cobalt blue in the early 19th century, was removed. A new, decorative frame was also made, which also served a protective function. It was also reported that the third word of the signature, epoiei (meaning "he made"), was deciphered, confirming the authorship of El Greco. After conservation, the painting was displayed from November 26 to 4 December 2016 at the Sukiennice Museum.
The fate of the painting before 1952 remains unclear. Various accounts exist, but their credibility has been questioned. In 2009, the painting's value was estimated at several million dollars, and by 2016, it was valued at 5 million USD.
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.
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