ANNUNCIATION

This painting, the work of Giovan Battista Salvi, known as “Il Sassoferrato”, is one of a series of copies which could best be defined as intelligent re-proposals with variations on the theme by this painter from the Marches, created with the work of Raphael and Perugino in mind. In this case, the artist has chosen as his model The Annunciation on the left panel of the Oddi altar piece by Raphael. This piece, originally in the church of San Francesco in Perugia, was confiscated by the French in 1797. It was recovered by Antonio Canova in 1815, and immediately destined for the Vatican Picture Gallery. The Annunciation was painted in 1639, which is the same period during which Salvi also painted his copy of Raphael’s The Deposition, another beautiful piece executed for the monks of San Pietro. Agostino Tofanelli had chosen this painting among the works to be requisitioned for the Capitoline Museums (1812), but fortunately it never left the city, as it was in a Church where the liturgy was officiated. Along with The Annunciation, other works such as The Deposition and Judith and the Head of Holofernes were also to have been requisitioned. The latter is an original painting by Salvi, and can be included among the greatest classicistic works of the 17th century. The paintings executed by Il Sassoferrato for the Church of San Pietro, including The Immaculate Conception, now in the Louvre, were to have been part of an iconographically similar and consistent series, the purpose of which was the exaltation of the figure of the Blessed Virgin.