Oil Painting, 'Church of S. Onofrio, Rome: the Interior with a Cardinal', Alessandro Rizzoni, 1872

The interior of a church in Rome; a cardinal, accompanied by his secretary and servant, kneels at a prie-dieu before monument above which is a fresco of the Virgin Mary and the Child with a book.

Bequeathed by John Forster

Bequeathed by John Forster, 1876.
A note by the artist concerning this picture is preserved in the Forster Collection in the Museum Library (MSS, x, p. 2, no. 23): 'L'interno della chiesa del convento di Sant'Onofrio a Roma ove more il Tasso. La Madonna dipinto al fresco (supra il monumento del Vescovo) è del Pinturicchio, e l'altro fresco a destra è del cavaliere d'Arpino. La scena rappresente il cardinale Barnabo (Prottettore della chiesa) accompagnato del . . . suo segretario e del servitore dopo d'aver assisto allo funzione religiosa. Roma il 27 Ottobre 1873. Alessandro Rizzoni.'

Historical significance: This painting is a fine example of Alexander Antonovich Rizzoni's art, which is principally constituted of scenes of Roman life and pictures of bishops and cardinals. Here he combined the two in this scene of a cardinal praying in a Roman church after the mass. The painting shows indeed the church of the Convent of Sant'Onofrio on the Janiculum Hill in Rome, with the Cardinale Barnabò kneeling at a prie-dieu, his secretary dressed in black immediately behind him and a servant standing behind, as described by the artist in a note from the Forster Collection in the Museum Library (MSS, x, p. 2, no. 23)
['L'interno della chiesa del convento di Sant'Onofrio a Roma ove more il Tasso. La Madonna dipinto al fresco (supra il monumento del Vescovo) è del Pinturicchio, e l'altro fresco a destra è del cavaliere d'Arpino. La scena rappresente il cardinale Barnabo (Prottettore della chiesa) accompagnato del . . . suo segretario e del servitore dopo d'aver assisto allo funzione religiosa. Roma il 27 Ottobre 1873. Alessandro Rizzoni.']
The painting meticulously reproduced the decoration of the interior of the church: the fresco showing the Madonna and Child above the funerary monument of a bishop was believed at the time to be executed by the early Renaissance painter Bernardino Pinturicchio (ca. 1452-1513) while the fresco on the right was depicted by the mannerist painter Giuseppe Cesari, called Cavalier d'Arpino (1568-1640). The Church of Sant'Onofrio al Gionicolo also housed the tomb of the Renaissance poet Torquato Tasso, who lived in the monastery and died there on April 25, 1595.
The protagonist of the painting, Cardinal Alessandro Barnabò (1801-1874), was an important figure during the reign of Pope Pius IX (1792-1878), of whom he was one of the right hand men. He was Prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith (Sacra Congregatio de Propaganda Fide) for 18 years from 1856 until his death in 1874 and Protector of the Pontifical North American College, Rome. The Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith dealt with the propagation of the faith in non-catholic countries such as England, North America and Africa. He was also appointed camerlengo of the Sacred College of Cardinals (1868-1869). He participated in the First Vatican Council (1869-1870) and was president of the congregation for the affairs of the Oriental rites and the apostolic missions.

'Genre painting' describes scenes of everyday life set in domestic interiors or in the countryside, especially those produced by 17th-century Dutch painters such as Gerard ter Borch, Jan Steen, and Pieter de Hooch. These subjects were not particularly popular with Italian artists before the 18th century. Even then, Italian genre painting is mainly restricted to works produced by Northern artists active in Bologna and the Veneto such as Giuseppe Maria Crespi (1665-1747), Giovanni Battista Piazzetta (1682-1754), Pietro Longhi (ca. 1701-1785) and Giacomo Ceruti (1698-1767). In this pre-Enlightment society, issues of social class, the legitimacy of power and the needs of common people were beginning to be discussed in Holland, England and France and the debates were slowly filtering down to Italy. Bolognese intellectual life was particularly active and Crespi, who was corresponding one of the most notable academics, Antonio Muratori (1672-1750), appears to have created a visual response to these debates. The works of the Bamboccianti, mostly Netherlandish painters specialising in low-life paintings, painted in Rome in the mid 17th century, may also have provided a source for Italian genre painters while the commedia dell'arte profoundly inspired Crespi and the development of this new Italian version of genre painting. From Bologna the genre spread to Venice thanks to Venetians artists such as Piazzetta and Longhi. They drew the attention of foreign collectors, most notably Joseph Smith the British Consul in Venice, who amassed an impressive collection of such artworks and of Venetian art in general and contributed to the growing taste for these in England.

Alexander Antonovich Rizzoni (1836-1902), born in Riga, was the son of an Italian soldier in Napoleon's army. He studied at the St Petersburg Academy and travelled in Germany, Holland and Spain. He spent some years in Paris and settled in Rome in 1865.

This painting is a fine example of Rizzoni’s art, which focused on scenes of the Roman life and particularly favoured the representation of clergymen. Here the scene is set in the Roman Church of the Convent of Sant'Onofrio and shows the Cardinal Barnabò followed by his secretary and a servant. The importance of the figure of Cardinal Barnabò makes Rizzoni’s picture a valuable document of the Roman Catholic life and its representatives during the 19th century.

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