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Saint Francis of Assisi

Szymon Czechowicz

Basic information

ID: Ж-3399‌
Author: Szymon Czechowicz
Name: Saint Francis of Assisi
Date of creation: c.1767
Country: Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
Technique: oil painting
Material: canvas oil
Dimensions: 58 x 45.5 cm (height x width)

Additionally

Type: painting
Genre: religious
Plot: Life of Saint Francis of Assisi
Provenance: Lviv Historical Museum
Exposition: Zhovkva Castle

Information about author

Author: Szymon Czechowicz
Author in the original: Szymon Czechowicz
Artist's lifetime: 1689–1775
Country: Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
Biography: Szymon Czechowicz was born in an impoverished noble family in Krakow on July 28, 1689. He became an orphan at a young age. Thanks to the support of his patron and philanthropist Franciszek Ossolinski, the artist went to Rome, where he studied painting at the Academy of St. Luke under the guidance of Carlo Maratti. The first professional works of the artist were copies after famous painters, such as Rubens, Van Dyck and others; the artist drew upon their iconographic compositions. In 1765, at the invitation of Waclaw Rzewuski, he arrived at Pidhirtsi Castle in the Lviv region; by 1767, Czechowicz created 107 works that became part of the castle interior and a kind of the first museum of the artist. During the last period of his life, Szymon Czechowicz worked in Lithuania and Warsaw, where he opened his own art studio. The painter died on July 21, 1775. He was considered to be one of the best artists of the Baroque era in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Among the master's creative legacy, there are portraits and monumental paintings on sacred themes.

Object description

Saint Francis is depicted on a brown background; he is dressed in a dark monastic robe girded with a rope made of hair. His hands are folded in a prayer pose in front of him. The face of the saint man is clean-shaven; the tonsure is cut around the top of his head. The man's eyes are raised; his facial features and expression are depicted quite conventionally.

Portrayed person