Ribera: Art of Violence,

Jusepe de Ribera,  Martyrdom of Saint  Bartholomew , 1624,  Etching with engraving, Print  Collection, Miriam and Ira  D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs, The  New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations .    

Jusepe de Ribera

Spanish, 1591 - 1652

The Martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew

1634

oil on canvas

overall: 104 x 113 cm (40 15/16 x 44 1/2 in.)

framed: 134.6 x 143.8 x 10.2 cm (53 x 56 5/8 x 4 in.)

Gift of the 50th Anniversary Gift Committee

1990.137.1

On View:West Building, Main Floor - Gallery 29

Jusepe de Ribera ,  Inquisition Scene ,  after 1635 ,  Pen and  brown  ink  with wash ,  20.6 x  16.5 cm ,  Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design ,  Providence,  Museum Works  of Art Fund 56.060 .  Photo :  Erik Gould, courtesy of the Museum of Art, Rhode  Island  School of Design, Providence .

Jusepe de Ribera, “Study for Martyrdom of St. Sebastian” (c. 1626), red chalk on paper, William Lowe Bryan Memorial, Indiana University Art Museum

 

Jusepe de Ribera, Crucifixion of Saint Peter , mid - 1620s, Brush and red ink wash over red  chalk,  Museo de la  Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernan do , Madrid . Photo:  ©  Museo de la Real Academia de Bella Artes de San Fernando, Madrid. 

The apostle Peter was crucified upside down, having considered himself unworthy of suffering as Christ had done. Subtly executed in red wash and red chalk, this sheet depicts the preparations before Peter’s crucifixion. Running a rope through a split in the wood, the executioners have created an inventive pulley system to raise the saint’s body on the cross. Realising the composition as a whole, the artist combines highly finished figures with barely suggested ones. It is the most complete of Ribera’s three drawings of this subject.  

Masterfully executed in ink and wash, this drawing is a variation on the theme of Saint Peter’s crucifixion. Ribera’s skillful handling of wash creates a dramatic contrast of light and shadow, and his deft pen strokes describe form and texture. The focus of this sheet is on the physical effort required to hoist the saint on the cross, which is raised at a steeper angle than in the other drawings of this subject, displayed nearby.  



 

 Study for the Crucifixion of Saint Peter , mid-1620s
Pen and brown ink The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Rogers Fund, 1919 

This summary sketch of the crucifixion of Saint Peter was rapidly conceived. The saint’ s left arm is incomplete, while the profile of his legs has been corrected. Ribera likely drew from a live model posed on the ground to depict Peter at an angle, and without his executioners. Ribera scribbled his monogram and initial on the sheet. The various letter ‘Js’ stand for ‘Jusepe’, while the elaborate letter ‘E’ may refer to the artist’s Spanish nationality (español). In the lower right corner he also doodled a scorpion (escorpión in Spanish), a creature traditionally associated with treachery due to the sting in its tail. This may allude to Peter, who denied his knowledge of Jesus three times before Christ’s crucifixion.  

SAINT SEBASTIAN, MARTYR AND MODEL  

Saint Sebastian was a subject that fascinated Ribera throughout his career. A young Roman soldier sentenced to death in the 4th century for his conversion to Christianity, Sebastian was initially shot with arrows and left for dead. He made a miraculous recovery, only to be martyred at a later date when he was beaten to death. Sebastian’s recovery caused him to be invoked as a protector during outbreaks of plague, whose symptoms include multiple swellings beneath the skin, notably under the armpits. Ribera made more than a dozen drawings, numerous paintings and one print of the subject. These images typically represent the saint with his armpit exposed, revealing his vulnerability. Collectively, they document and narrate pivotal moments in the legend of the saint: from preparing Sebastian for martyrdom, to shooting him with arrows, to tending his wounds.  

Jusepe de Ribera ,  Saint Sebastian Tended by theHoly Women,  c. 1620 - 23 ,  Oil on canvas ,  180 x 231  cm ,  Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao .  © Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa - Museo  de Bellas Artes de Bilbao .

Saint Sebastian Tended by the Holy Women , c. 1620–23 

Violence is both evoked and suppressed in this painting. The holy women tend to the reclining Sebastian, removing the arrows which pierce his body. Two angels bearing a crown and palm leaf, symbols of martyrdom, hover above the group. The painting contrasts with Ribera’s representations of Saint Bartholomew flayed alive: the subject here is healing rather than martyrdom, the flawless skin of the young Sebastian rather than the wrinkled flesh of the elderly Bartholomew. Ribera explores the tensions between the saint’s elegant pose and the pain implicit in the scene. 

 A youthful figure is seen frontally with both arms extended, as if tied by invisible cords, his head thrown back. While the figure is neither bound by ropes nor shot with arrows, his exposed armpits support his identification as Saint Sebastian. By focusing on the moment before his first attempted execution (the saint was fully martyred by being beaten to death), Ribera explores the saint’s physical vulnerability as he pleas to heaven for help.  

Jusepe de Ribera, Man Bound to a Stake ,  first half of the 1640s, P en and  brown ink with  wash, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco , San Francisco Achenbach Foundation for  Graphic Arts. Photo:  © Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco.     

Pen and brown ink Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford, Oxford Saint Sebastian being Tied to a Tree , late 1620s 

A kneeling man binds Sebastian’s legs in preparation for his martyrdom. Tilting his head towards the spectator, the saint raises his right arm in the air and points down with his left. Given the sketchy nature of the sheet, which is characteristic of Ribera’s preparatory drawings, this work may be a preliminary study for a lost painting by the artist. Red chalk Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton Gift of Frank Jewett Mather Jr  

Saint Sebastian Tied to a Tree , c. 1627–30 Subtly rendered and starkly illuminated, Sebastian gazes up to the divine light that bathes his body. Rather than focusing on narrative, Ribera has created an iconic image of the bound figure. The use of red chalk accented with brown ink is unique among Ribera’s representations of the saint, demonstrating the artist’s abilities in combining media to suggest different textures. Notably, the top of the blasted tree trunk, executed solely in ink, evokes rough bark, while the skin of the saint, rendered in red chalk, appears smooth and soft. Red chalk with pen and brown ink The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland Delia E. Holden Fund, 1997.53 

Saint Sebastian , second half of the 1630s Once attributed to Ribera’s contemporary Salvator Rosa (hence the inscription), this drawing of Saint Sebastian’s martyrdom is the most explicit of the group displayed here. The saint’s arms are bound above his head while one of the arrows piercing his body has gone straight through the flesh to lodge itself into the tree. Sebastian’s body cuts diagonally across the page, mirroring the tree trunk to which he is tied. Although it appears simple, the drawing’s sophisticated execution reveals the complexity of Ribera’s explorations of the bound figure. Pen, brown ink and brown wash Kupferstich-Kabinett, Staatliche Kunstsammlungen Dresden  

 

Old Man Tied to a Tree and a Young Man Defecating , late 1620s The identity of the bound figure in this drawing is unclear, as Ribera was primarily concerned with exploring the contorted and restrained male body. Ribera creates a visual parallel between the figure and the tree: his torso resembles the trunk and his limbs echo the branch. The position of the central figure is difficult, if not anatomically impossible to recreate in reality, and the artist has exaggerated the proportions of the body, elongating the saint’s extended arm and leg. One of the most intriguing aspects of the sheet is the ambiguous r elationship between Wall Labels the bound man and the defecating figure at the foot of the tree. Proverbial language may provide a context for interpreting this drawing: one Spanish proverb runs, ‘Dung is no saint, but where it falls it works miracles’. Red chalk The Courtauld Gallery, London, The Samuel Courtauld Trust  



Man Bound to a Tree , mid-1620s Arms crossed and raised above his head, this figure twists in an elegant snake-like curve and seems to float on the page. His identity is ambiguous: the str etched, youthful body evokes Saint Sebastian, while the satirical, grimacing expression suggests something sinister. Typically, Ribera creates a visual parallel between the body of the figure and the form of the tree, whose gnarled trunk extends into sinewy limbs. One of Ribera’s most refined drawings, this sheet demonstrates the artist’s virtuoso handling of red chalk and innovative treatment of the bound man theme. Red chalk Musée du Louvre, Département des arts graphiques, Paris  



Etching The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York Harris Brisbane Dick Fund, 1953 

 MYTHOLOGICAL VIOLENCE  

Jusepe de Ribera ,  Apollo and Marsyas ,  1637 ,  Oil on canvas ,  182 x 23 2  c m,  Museo e Real  Bosco di Capodimonte, Naples . Photo :  Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimo nte on kind  concession from the "Ministero dei  beni e delle attività culturali e del turismo



The painting displayed in this room depicts one of the most violent stories from Classical mythology: the myth of Apollo and Marsyas.The foolish satyr Marsyas challenged Apollo, god of music and the arts, to a musical contest. The satyr was a skilled musician, but the god inevitably triumphed. In one version of the myth, Apollo sang while plucking the strings of his lyre; in another version, he played his instrument upside down. Marsyas lost the competition, as he could not replicate the god’s performances with his aulos, a wind instrument similar to a flute. Apollo’s prize was to punish Marsyas by flaying him alive. Ribera’s depiction of the story draws inspiration from the Roman poet Ovid’s Metamorphoses. As the torture began, the satyr cried, ‘Why do you tear me from myself?’ and screamed, ‘Oh, I repent! Oh, a flute is not worth such price!’ But the god did not forgive the satyr, and the flaying continued until Marsyas was ‘all one wound’. As the satyr’s blood flowed everywhere, the creatures of the woods wept for their unfortunate friend. 

Apollo and Marsyas , 

1637 The unfortunate satyr Marsyas stares out helplessly at the spectator as the god Apollo, unnervingly serene, flays the satyr’s hide with his hands. Visible in the foreground is a Baroque instrument similar to a violin, depicted instead of the lyre used in Classical antiquity. Marsyas’ flute, here a panpipe, hangs from a tree branch. Ribera has used the story of musical rivalry between the satyr and the god to create a painting with many layers of meaning. Beyond representing a scene of extreme violence, this work warns against the dangers of hubris, the foolish arrogance that led Marsyas to challenge Apollo to a musical contest. No mortal artist, no matter how skilled, should ever dare to compete with a god. Yet the work is also a commentary on artistic practice itself, on the status of the arts and the potential for painting and sculpture to imitate reality. Athletic and pale, Apollo recalls the sculptures of Classical antiquity, like the marble bust on display in the first room. In Ribera’s paintings of the martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew, the head of Apollo is not triumphant but overturned. In contrast, here Apollo seems to dominate Marsyas, as if sculpture had won the contest. Yet, this scene is represented through the art of painting. Perhaps Ribera is suggesting that painting and sculpture are not merely rivals, like the god and satyr, but companions.