(Sassoferrato 1609–1685 Rome)
Madonna in prayer,
oil on canvas, 28.3 x 22 cm, framed

Provenance:
Private collection, Rome

The present painting relates to one of Sassoferrato’s most celebrated compositions. It depicts the Madonna, bust length, with her head slightly inclined, her gaze lowered and her hands folded in prayer.

Sassoferrato returned to this subject many times throughout his career, and the simplicity and sobriety of the composition established it among the most effective and recognisable religious images of the seventeenth century.

Other than a few public commissions and portraits, Sassoferrato mainly painted small religious pictures intended for private devotion, whose intense and moving depictions were much appreciated. His popularity in the mid-seventeenth century was influenced by the new interest in Mariology since the Counter-Reformation had increased emphasis on the veneration of the Virgin.

Giovanni Battista Salvi was known by the name of his town of birth, Sassoferrato (Marche) and was primarily active in nearby Urbino and other central Italian cities. After receiving his early training from his father, he made a formative journey to Rome, where he was influenced not only by the classicism of his contemporaries Guido Reni, Domenichino and the Carracci, but above all by the works of Raphael.