Martyrdom of St Agatha

Though a fine draughtsman and painter himself, Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo has always been overshadowed by his illustrious father, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo. He seems to have been content to be so, as he worked closely with his father on the large-scale fresco commissions he undertook in Venice, Germany and Spain. He also made etchings after his father's paintings, thereby establishing the elder Tiepolo's European-wide reputation.

Martyrdom of St Agatha is based on the large altarpiece of the same subject painted for the Benedictine convent at Lendinara on the Venetian mainland about 1755. This was subsequently removed and cut down (it is now in the Gemäldegalerie, Berlin). The top section of the painting, together with the object of Agatha's upturned gaze, has been lost. The print records its original appearance and we see that she is looking up to a vision of Heaven and a flaming heart.

Saint Agatha was a third-century virgin martyr from Sicily who was tortured to death for rejecting the love of the Roman governor. As part of the gruesome ordeal the executioner sliced off her breasts - they can be seen on the platter carried by the young man on the right. As Agatha falls to her knees, she looks up to the vision of her salvation and points to the palm leaves - a symbol of her martyrdom - at the bottom of the steps.

Giovanni Domenico has managed to convey something of the scale and drama of the painting in this large etchings. The rich painted texture is also captured in the flickering lines. The inscription at the bottom of the print declares the combined authorship of the work. The larger letters translate as 'Giovanni Battista Tiepolo invented and painted it' and below, referring to the print, 'Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo drew and made it'. Published only a year after the painting was completed, the print spread the image to a much wider audience than the nuns of the remote convent for whom it was originally made.

Republished from: David Maskill, 'Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo...', in William McAloon (ed.), Art at Te Papa (Wellington, 2009), p. 37.