In a New Light: Giovanni Bellini's "St Francis in the Desert"

Giovanni Bellini's St. Francis in the Desert is a masterpiece of Venetian Renaissance art that portrays St. Francis of Assisi, the medieval saint who renounced earthly riches to embrace a humble existence. Departing from canonical representations of the holy man's life, Bellini imagined St. Francis alone in a mountainous wilderness, stepping from his simple shelter into a golden light that seems to transfigure him spiritually. For centuries, viewers have puzzled over the work's meaning, but until recently, the artist's practical conception and realization have remained largely unexplored. In a New Light: Giovanni Bellini's "St. Francis in the Desert" presents the collective findings of an unprecedented technical examination of the painting. Following a series of in-depth analyses-including X-radiography, microscopy and paint sampling-an international group of specialists has considered the artist's working process and its implications for the painting's meaning. Their findings provide a “glimpse over Bellini's shoulder” and open new avenues of research into Venetian Renaissance painting and its cultural and religious context. Also published here for the first time are recently discovered documents pertaining to the provenance of St. Francis in the Desert during the 19th century and synthetic studies of the work's Franciscan milieu and early history. A monograph of a single picture, In a New Light comprises essays and technical studies by leading experts in paintings conservation, Venetian art and Franciscan thought, along with more than 150 colour illustrations that reveal Bellini's masterwork as it has never been seen before. AUTHOR: Susannah Rutherglen is a Fellow of the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation and former Andrew W. Mellon Curatorial Fellow at the Frick Collection. She co-curated the exhibition In a New Light: Bellini's St. Francis in the Desert with Charlotte Hale and Denise Allen at the Frick in 2011. Charlotte Hale is the Metropolitan Museum of Art Paintings Conservator; she oversaw the recent technical study of St Francis in the Desert (2010) Illustrated