Giovan Battista Gaulli, known as Baciccia
(Genoa 1639 – Rome 1709)
The Triumph of the Name of Jesus
Oil on canvas, 179.5×120 cm
This luminous “bozzettone” is a large preparatory model for the most important fresco decoration of the Roman Baroque, the vault of the Church of the Gesù, a few steps from Piazza Venezia.
It is a precious testimony, for its size and for the level of execution, as well as for the sublime quality of the painting and the importance of the final fresco to which it refers.
Giovan Battista Gaulli, one of the main protagonists of Roman painting in the second half of the 17th century, carried out the decoration of the Gesù between 1668 and 1679. The Jesuits asked for models to approve the work, and the painter presented his vision of the radiant triumph of Christ’s monogram, IHS, the emblem of the Society of Saint Ignatius, at the centre of the sun and surrounded by angelic hosts. It is also the triumph of perspective illusionism, of Catholic rhetoric, of moral teaching for the spirit, while the eye is delighted: in the centre of the scene, in the golden dust, are the Church, the Saints, the Magi; below, the allegories of sin, heresy, vanity.
It was Cardinal Fabrizio Spada who made it possible for this very special painting to enter the collection: perhaps it was a gift from the Jesuit Fathers themselves, with whom the Cardinal had close relations.
