The Dead Saint Cecilia (Roman Version) – Works – Sammlung Online

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The image depicts a scene where two angels are portrayed in a loving moment. One angel is kneeling close to a sleeping person whose head rests on a folded cloth. The angel on the left has its hands at the lips of the other angel, who is standing above and pointing to a green branch. The lower part of the image shows a natural background with plants and a landscape in the background.

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The Dead Saint Cecilia (Roman Version)
Date1820–1821

Artist Johann Evangelist Scheffer von Leonhardshoff (1795 Wien – 1822 Wien)

ULAN

Object typePainting
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions
146 × 193 cm
SignatureSign. und bez. am Mantelsaum: [Johann]es Scheffer pin[xit] S. Caeciliae. v[irgini] Roma
Inventory number2244
Location Currently not on display
Saint Cecilia lies on the ground as if asleep. Two angels hover over her, one holding a palm frond as a symbol of her triumph over death. Only a small cut in the back of her neck indicates that she has been martyred, a fate she suffered as a Christian in Rome in the third century. Scheffer von Leonhardshoff joined the Nazarenes in 1815. Rejecting Neoclassicism, they regarded Raphael’s painting as their ideal. It was from Raphael that Scheffer adopted the triangular composition of his figures. The fingers of Cecilia’s right hand are conspicuous: they could allude to the Holy Trinity or to the organ that the martyr—the patron saint of church music—was often depicted playing.

Provenance
Exhibitions

Nachlass des Künstlers.
1822 Ankauf für Kaiserliche Gemäldegalerie
1922 Übernahme aus dem Kunsthistorischen Museum, Wien

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