The Angel Appearing to Saint Jerome

Description

This painting is a late work of Reni, demonstrating qualities of rapidity and self-assurance. At that time Reni had abandoned the smooth finish that had been characteristic of his earlier work in favor of a slightly looser and more animated surface[1]. The abstract elegance of his previous canvases gives way to works that are perhaps less "perfect" but emotionally richer.

In this work, the spiritual encounter between Saint Jerome and the angel is expressed by brilliant colors and an array of gestures that are theatrical without being melodramatic. St. Jerome sits before a cave, where he has withdrawn from a worldly life to do penance and to prepare his commentaries and Latin translation of the Bible. In the midst of his labors, an angel appears to assist his work. The Saint meditates upon the skull, which rests isolated on a shelf of stone. As a prominent reminder of the presence of death, it is particularly touching because of Reni's own advanced age when he created this work. The Saint rests his elbow on his books while he turns his face towards the beautiful messenger. The confrontation of the aged man, ruddy in complexion with thick shoulders and neck, and the luminous white youth whose golden tresses are stirred by his rapid movement, eloquently expresses the gulf that separates the mortal man from the divine messenger. Yet they face each other almost at eye level, which suggests an intimacy in their communication.

Reni seemed to invent the representation of an angel appearing to St. Jerome while he is writing. Traditionally, an angel appears to St. Jerome in his study to chastise him for becoming a “Ciceronian,” which is a student devoted to the classics rather than a Christian. An angel appears to him a second time in the desert and blows the trumpet call for the Last Judgment. For the iconographically uncommon representation, Reni might have adopted Caravaggio’s first altarpiece of the subject for the Contarelli Chapel in S. Luigi dei Francesi[2].

References

[1]Pepper, D. Stephen. “The Angel Appearing to Saint Jerome by Guido Reni, a New Acquisition.” Bulletin of the Detroit Institute of Arts 48, no. 2 (1969): 26–35. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23182587.

[2]Pepper, D. Stephen. 1984. Guido Reni: a complete catalogue of his works with an introductory text. New York: New York University Press.