.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
Although the early history of this small panel painting is unknown, it was almost certainly created for private devotion. Its intimate scale, fluid handling of paint, and the Madonna’s richly coloured ultramarine cloak indicate that it must have been commissioned by a wealthy patron. The Madonna and Child, seated on a cloud and surrounded by a heavenly glow, appear to Saint Martina in a vision. The Madonna extends a flower garland, while the infant Christ offers her a palm frond, a symbol of the saint’s martyrdom. Martina kneels reverently before them, holding the instrument of her torture – a bloodstained hook from which she was suspended – in the crook of her arm.
Saint Martina was a third-century Christian martyr and one of the patron saints of Rome. She was tortured and ultimately put to death for refusing to worship idols; something referenced here in the lightning bolt striking the classical temple in the background. The saint held great personal significance for Pietro da Cortona, who painted her image numerous times, including the single-figure canvas in Los Angeles County Museum of Art (c.1635-40), the Madonna and Child with Saint Martina (1645) in the Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, and an altarpiece depicting her martyrdom (1655-56) in Siena Cathedral. A number of paintings of this subject by Pietro da Cortona are also recorded in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Roman inventories. An architect as well as a painter, Pietro da Cortona became president of the Accademia di San Luca in 1634. He designed a new church for the academy, dedicated to Saint Martina, in the Roman Forum. It was during excavations for the crypt, where the artist himself intended to be buried, that Saint Martina’s remains were discovered.
The painting is known in an almost identical version, also on panel, though less spirited in handling, in a private collection (Una gloria europea. Pietro da Cortona a Firenze (1637-1647), eds. R. Contini and F. Solinas, exhibition catalogue, Florence, 2010, no. 24). An X-radiograph of the present work reveals that the panel was reused, perhaps because the first composition had been abandoned. When rotated 90 degrees clockwise, a female figure in the same pose as Saint Martina in another painting by Pietro da Cortona (1645-48; Galleria Nazionale dell’Umbria, Perugia) becomes visible: this firmly places the present work within Cortona’s workshop during the 1640s.
The attribution to Pietro da Cortona has been endorsed after firsthand inspection by Francesco Petrucci, whose written study on the work (dated January 2026) is available on request. We are grateful to Anna Lo Bianco for independently endorsing the attribution on the basis of photographs (written communication, May 2026).
Saint Martina was a third-century Christian martyr and one of the patron saints of Rome. She was tortured and ultimately put to death for refusing to worship idols; something referenced here in the lightning bolt striking the classical temple in the background. The saint held great personal significance for Pietro da Cortona, who painted her image numerous times, including the single-figure canvas in Los Angeles County Museum of Art (c.1635-40), the Madonna and Child with Saint Martina (1645) in the Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, and an altarpiece depicting her martyrdom (1655-56) in Siena Cathedral. A number of paintings of this subject by Pietro da Cortona are also recorded in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Roman inventories. An architect as well as a painter, Pietro da Cortona became president of the Accademia di San Luca in 1634. He designed a new church for the academy, dedicated to Saint Martina, in the Roman Forum. It was during excavations for the crypt, where the artist himself intended to be buried, that Saint Martina’s remains were discovered.
The painting is known in an almost identical version, also on panel, though less spirited in handling, in a private collection (Una gloria europea. Pietro da Cortona a Firenze (1637-1647), eds. R. Contini and F. Solinas, exhibition catalogue, Florence, 2010, no. 24). An X-radiograph of the present work reveals that the panel was reused, perhaps because the first composition had been abandoned. When rotated 90 degrees clockwise, a female figure in the same pose as Saint Martina in another painting by Pietro da Cortona (1645-48; Galleria Nazionale dell’Umbria, Perugia) becomes visible: this firmly places the present work within Cortona’s workshop during the 1640s.
The attribution to Pietro da Cortona has been endorsed after firsthand inspection by Francesco Petrucci, whose written study on the work (dated January 2026) is available on request. We are grateful to Anna Lo Bianco for independently endorsing the attribution on the basis of photographs (written communication, May 2026).