Technologies to the Service of the Ideas and Images

Cabinets, buffet stands and writing desks were indispensable items of furniture, both in the inside of the homes of the rich and powerful, and in offices and other places of power, mainly linked to the Spanish crown. Their possession implies social prestige, and the more pieces of this type of furniture  one had, the higher their social status.   

This image represents Saint Dominic (Santo Domingo de Guzman), a Spanish saint born in the twelfth century and founder of the order of preachers to which his name is given. Although it is a round, freestanding sculpture, and of a little less than natural size, the outline of the volume in the back part and the lack of polychrome in this area indicate that the execution gave preference to the front of the character, establishing that it must have been conceived as an altarpiece.   

This painting follows to the letter the dedication that the priest Juan Antonio Genovesi used for preaching from 1722 onward. In this year, in Palermo, the Jesuit asked a lay sister for the Virgin Mary to reveal herself in the way that she wanted to be represented, and the Virgin sent a vision. After a failed interpretation from the summoned painter, the Virgin made herself visible again to the woman in the same way that she had appeared originally, so that the lay sister could memorize her and she could be painted.