A study of Agostino Carracci's The Last Communion of Saint Jerome

The Last Communion of Saint Jerome is considered the greatest work of Agostino Carracci -- the eldest brother of Annabile Carracci and founding member of the Carracci Academy -- and a clear illustration of the Carricci philosophy in opposition to Mannerism. I evaluate the painting in this post.

The Last Communion of Saint Jerome, 1592 - 97 
Agostino Carracci

The Subject

The painting depicts the Last Communion being given to Saint Jerome by Saint Eusebius. It is based on one of three apocryphal letters from Eusebius to the Pope wherein he "recounts" the administration of the Eucharist just prior to Jerome's death.

Saint Jerome (347 - 420) was born in Dalmatia (modern-day Croatia) but moved to Rome during his teenage years. He was baptized as a Christian in Rome and, thereafter, embarked on a life of religious study, writing, translation, and ascetism. Included in his accomplishments were the roles of advisor to Pope Damasus I and the translation of the Latin Vulgate Bible (the New Testament from Greek to Latin and the Old Testament from Hebrew to Latin). Jerome relocated to Palestine on the Pope's death and set about establishing monasteries for men and and women while living, studying, and writing in his cell.

The Artist

Agostino Carracci started out as a goldsmith's apprentice but turned to painting and was trained, initially, by Prospero Fontano, and then by Passerotti and Domenico Tibaldi. He worked as a reproductive engraver in the late 1570s and visited Venice and Parma in the 1580s before returning to Bologna to aid in the founding of the Carracci Academy.

Agostino and his brother Annabile returned to Bologna tours of Northern Italian painters and collaborated with their cousin Ludovico in the formation of an academy focused on teaching art. The Carracci used the academy to "promote the idea that art should draw directly from nature for its study," an idea that was a direct refutation of Mannerism's focus on complexity and artificiality. 

The key innovation for the Carracci was the melding of the design characteristics of Florentine art with the colors of Venetian art and their naturalism into a style that was characterized by clear, simple, direct imagery. This style comported well with the guidelines established by the Council of Trent and was enthusiastically endorsed in Rome. It is thus no coincidence that the Carracci came to dominate the religious art scene and their works began to show up in many churches, chapels, and cathedrals.

They worked together on the Palazzo Fava in 1583 and the Palazzo Magnani in 1590-92.

The Painting

The painting was commissioned in 1590 by Certosa di Bologna, a former Carthusian monastery located just outside the city walls and dedicated to Saint Jerome. 

The painting is centered on a blue-and-gold-robed Saint Eusebius preparing to administer the Eucharist to an emaciated Saint Jerome who is, in turn, being supported by two monks. I have annotated the painting in the figure below in order to highlight my observations.

The Last Communion of Saint Jerome, 1592 - 97 (annotated) 
Agostino Carracci

The representation falls well within the high-renaissance tradition, in keeping with the Carracci refutation of the Mannerist style. It also adheres to the dictates of the Council of Trent by telling a religious (-associated) story simply and clearly (The apocryphal nature of the underlying story may be a departure from the Trent strictures, however.).

The picture was very naturalistic in its representation of the figures (a Carracci feature) but did not show the vibrancy of color, another attribute of their style.

Other Treatments of this Topic

Sandro Botticelli and Domenichino both painted versions of this topic.

Sandro Botticelli

Botticelli's version was painted between 1494 and 1495, 100 years prior to Carracci's effort and during the time when he was painting religious rather than mythological subjects.

The scene is set in the mid-ground of a church-like structure which is open on the side facing the viewer. As in the case of the Carracci effort, there are two groups, but the number in each group is smaller in this case. The figures in the composition, as in the Carracci case, take up about one-half of the vertical space. The composition falls within the framework of an upturned bowl. Further, Saint Jerome is attended by monks while Saint Eusebius is attended by Altar Boys. 

The symbolic candles and Cardinal's hat are included in the painting. The figure of Jesus on the Cross is almost hidden in the palm fronds jutting upwards from the altar. The painting also includes a great representation of differential textures in the fabrics between the two saints. 

The Last Communion of Saint Jerome,  1494 - 95
Sandro Botticelli

Domenichino

The Domenichino effort was painted approximately 20 years after Carracci's version. This work was commissioned by the congregation of San Girolamo and was Domenichino's first public commission for an altarpiece. He was paid 254 scudi for the effort.

There is a degree of similarity between the two paintings, some of which is masked by the differing color scheme and the reversal of the figures. 

Domenichino had been a student of the Carracci in Bologna and had traveled to Rome along with a number of other students to assist Annibale Carracci in the painting of the Farnese Gallery frescoes. One of those students -- Giovanni Lanfranco -- accused Domenichino of stealing ideas for his painting from the Carracci painting.

The Last Judgment of Saint Jerome, 1611 - 14
Domenichino

Painting Provenance

This painting was taken -- along with works by Antonio and Bartolomeo Vivarini and Ludovico Carricci -- to Paris by Napolean. Upon its repatriation, it was deposited in the Pinacoteco Nazionale.

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Annabile Carracci and the Farnese Gallery frescoes

Palazzo Farnese, first designed for the Farnese family, and expanded when Alessandro Farnese became Pope Paul III in 1534, is one of the most important High Renaissance palaces in Rome (It currently serves as the French Embassy, having been loaned to the French for 99 years beginning in 1936.). Annabelle Carracci, founding member of the "Carracci Academy" was invited to Rome in 1594 to decorate the study of Cardinal Odoardo Farnese and to paint the ceiling of the Farnese Gallery. 

Why was Annabile invited to Rome? 

First, the Carraci had developed a new painting style which accorded with the views and objectives of the Catholic Church. The key innovation for the Carracci was the melding of the design characteristics of Florentine art with the colors of Venetian art and their naturalism into a style that was characterized by clear, simple, direct imagery. This style comported well with the guidelines established by the Council of Trent and was enthusiastically endorsed in Rome. 

Second, this new style had brought fame to the Carraci, especially Annabile. The Carracci came to dominate the religious art scene and their works began to show up in many churches, chapels, and cathedrals. They worked together, for example, on the Palazzo Fava in 1583 and the Palazzo Magnani in 1590-92.

Third, connections. According to Vodret and Granata (Not only Caravaggio), "Even though (Pope) Innocent ruled for only two months (ed., November 3 to December 31, 1591), he found time to develop closer ties with Alessandro Farnese and Paolo Emilio Sfondrati, who were, as Morselli observes, very important points of reference in the careers of Annibale Caracci and Guido Reni."

Annibale traveled to Rome in 1595 and decorated a small chamber called Sala d'Ercole rather than the study. In 1597 he was commissioned to decorate the barrel-vaulted gallery on the palace's main floor. The frescoes were ordered in celebration of the wedding between Ranuccio Farnese and Pope Clemente VIIIs niece Margherita Aldobrandini. The contract allowed for food-related expenses to be deducted from the overall contract cost. The design called for mythical figures -- rather than the religious scenes that were more in vogue at that time -- in order to comport with the Farnese antique art collection.

Annabile invited his brother and cousin to join him in Rome to work on the commission. Ludovico was comfortable working with the students at the Academy in Bologna and opted to remain there. His elder brother Agostino joined him but they could not get along so he left.

The work was created in large part between 1597 and 1601 but was not finalized until 1608. According to Vodret and Granata:

Annibale painted the vault of the gallery with "various emblems representing war and peace between sacred and profane love as described by Plato" ... mythological scenes were inserted into a fictive architectural framework that combines marvelously sculptural and naturalistic elements, medallions, and framed pictures that represent a joyful series of stories about the loves of the gods, culminating in the nuptial scene the Triumph of Bacchus and Ariadne. Ingeniously inspired by Michelangelo's ceiling in the Sistine chapel, Carracci's vault is a festive counterpoint, and with its luminous colors, and the naturalistic handling of fleshy figures and airy horizons, it points to the exuberant expressivity of the Baroque.

Selected aspects of the frescoes are shown in the following frames.

The Loves of The Gods on the vaults of the Farnese Gallery
Annabile Carracci, 1597 - 1601

Farnese Gallery, 1597 - 1608
Annabile Carracci and studio

Farnese Gallery, 1597 - 1608
Annabile Carracci and studio

The Triumph of Bacchus and Ariadne, 1597 - 1608
Annabile Carracci and studio

Polyphemus and Galatea, 1597 - 1608
Annabile Carracci and studio

According to Vodret and Granata,

The frescoes on the gallery walls (1602-3), which are connected thematically to the ceiling, were painted by Carracci's excellent students, including Domenichino and Lanfranco. These and the other Bolognese artists who came to Rome to study with Annabile and to work with his shop achieved what was almost a monopoly on all the large-scale fresco commissions in Roman villas, palaces, and churches in the first decades of the seventeenth century.

In this effort Annibale "introduced a new grand manner of fresco painting" which was "ranked  alongside The Sistine Chapel and Raphael Rooms as the greatest achievement of monumental fresco painting. This new style paved the way for the new idiom of Baroque painting" (visual-arts-cork.com). The unveiling of the ceiling in 1601 brought great acclaim and demand for Annabile's work.

Most painters working in Rome at that time were either flashy, or aggressive, or both. Annabile was neither. He was rather retiring and a poor dresser. The Cardinal did not approve of his demeanor and looks and was very disrespectful to him during the course of the project. Annibale did not take visible offence and kept his head down and the work going. The culmination of the effort was too much for him to bear though. At the completion of the effort the Cardinal subtracted the food costs and paid Annibale a paltry sum.  Annibale fell into a deep depression as a result and ceased painting. Rather, he would do sketches which would then serve as the basis for paintings from his students. Annibale died in 1609.

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The roots of the anti-Mannerist, proto-Baroque, Bolognese School (1590 - 1630)

The Council of Trent (1545 - 1563), in its attempts to blunt the effects of the Protestant Reformation, issued a number of decrees, including one which welcomed religious imagery as an aid in religious teaching. According to witcombe.sbc.edu, the religious imagery employed in this manner was expected to exhibit:

• Clarity, simplicity, and intelligibility 
• Realistic interpretation
• Emotionally stimulate piety.

While the church was open to the use of painted works to communicate religious messages to the masses, it did not conceive of the then-dominant painting style -- Mannerism -- as being up to the task. Post-1550 Mannerism exhibited (witcombe.sbc.edu):

• Virtuosity of execution and highly decorative surface qualities go with compositional decentralization and spatial and coloristic complexities
• Deliberate physical and psychic ambiguities puzzle the beholder
• Intricacies of handling are often matched by the intricacies of content
• Many pictures and fresco cycles of the period are obscure and esoteric 
• Little power to stir religious emotions in the mass of the faithful
• Lacked clarity, realism, and emotional intensity.

The images below show the difference between Correggio's Noli Me Tangere -- done in the High Renaissance style -- versus the Mannerist representation by Bronzino. 

Noli me Tangere, c. 1525
Antonia da Correggio

Noli me Tangere, 1561
Agnolo Bronzino

Painting in the Late Mannerist style (1550 - 1580) represented "an extraordinary decline in quality" from the High Renaissance. The movement which stepped into the breach was the Bolognese School (c.1590 - 1630), an "anti-Mannerist" art movement founded by the Bolognese-based Carracci family. "Ludovico Carracci and his cousins led the charge in the greatest reform of artistry since Cimabue and Giotto, and the first reactionary art Revolution in Western Art History" (The Carracci and Caravaggio Revolution: Foundations of the Baroque, forums.civfanatics.com). Lets take a look at the family and the fruits of their activities.

The Carracci

Ludovico was the oldest of the trio that included him and his two cousins: Annabile and Agostino. Ludovico was initially apprenticed to the painter Prospero Fontano who, after some time, sought to dissuade him from pursuing that career track because he did not "have the nature for it." Ludovico was not dissuaded, however, and went off to study on his own, traveling through North and Central Italy to study the works of Renaissance painters such as Andrea del Sarto (Florence), Parmagiannino (Parma), Giulio Romano (Mantua), and Titian and Tintoretto ( Enice).

Annibale Caracci's father was a tailor in Bologna. Due to the family's financial circumstances, Annibale was forced to leave school at the age of 11 to begin an apprenticeship with a goldsmith. His training while there included learning to draw and it soon became apparent that he was very talented; so much so that his apprenticeship was switched to the Mannerist painter Bartolomeo Passerotti.

In 1580, Annibale took off on a study tour of northern Italy, stopping in Correggio's studio in Parma and then moving on to Venice where he met up with his brother Agostino. In Venice they studied the works of the painters Titian, Veronese, Giorgione, and Tintoretto and marveled at their mastery of color and light. 

Agostino also started out as a goldsmith's apprentice but turned to painting and was trained, initially, by Prospero Fontano, and then by Passerotti and Domenico Tibaldi. He worked as a reproductive engraver in the late 1570s and visited Venice and Parma in the 1580s before returning to Bologna to aid in the founding of the Carracci Academy.

The Carracci Academy

The Carracci brothers returned to Bologna and collaborated with their cousin Ludovico in the formation of an academy focused on teaching art. The Carracci used the academy to "promote the idea that art should draw directly from nature for its study," and idea that was a direct refutation of Mannerism's focus on complexity and artificiality. The genesis of the school is illustrated in the chart below.

The key innovation for the Carracci was the melding of the design characteristics of Florentine art with the colors of Venetian art and their naturalism into a style that was characterized by clear, simple, direct imagery. This style comported well with the guidelines established by the Council of Trent and was enthusiastically endorsed in Rome. It is thus no coincidence that the Carracci came to dominate the religious art scene and their works began to show up in many churches, chapels, and cathedrals.

They worked together on the Palazzo Fava in 1583 and the Palazzo Magnani in 1590-92. In 1594 Cardinal Farnese invited Annibale to Rome to work on Palazzo Farnese and commissioned him in 1597 to work on the frescoes for the Gallery. He was joined by Agostino for this effort.

Lamentation of Christ, c. 1582
Ludovico Carracci

Annunciation
Ludovico Carracci

Madonna and Child with Saints, 1586
Agostino Carracci

The Lamentation, 1586
Agostino Carracci

The Butcher’s Shoo, 1583
Annibale Carracci

The Bean eater, 1580 - 1590
Annibale Carracci

Rest on the Flight into Egypt, 1600
Annibale Carracci

Pieta, 1599 - 1600
Annibale Carracci

Landscape with Flight into Egypt, 1604
Annibale Carracci

In his trial in Rome, Caravaggio identified Annibile as one of the 10 best artists in Rome at that time. And it is easy to see why. in addition to his life studies and drawings, Annibale was accomplished in frescoes, a style that evaded Caravvagio. In addition, Annabelle was accomplished in genre scenes and landscapes.

In future posts I will explore the Farnese Gallery frescoes, the legacy of the Carraccis, and the role of the Carracci students in the overall influence and impact of The Bolognese School.

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