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The Fall of Simon Magus

c. 1745- 1750

studio of Pompeo Batoni

(Italian, 1708-1787)

Italy, 18th century

Oil on canvas

Framed: 207 x 133 x 10.5 cm (81 1/2 x 52 3/8 x 4 1/8 in.); Unframed: 183 x 108 cm (72 1/16 x 42 1/2 in.)

John L. Severance Fund 1983.217

Location

217 Italian Baroque

Description

Saints Peter and Paul came to Rome to win converts to Christianity soon after Christ’s death, while Simon Magus, claiming to be the son of God, attempted to prove his divinity by flying. Due to Saint Peter’s prayers, the demons supporting Simon abandoned him and he plummeted to his death.This work is probably a studio copy after a lost oil sketch for a huge altarpiece commissioned in 1746 for Saint Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican. Because of the humidity in Saint Peter’s, which quickly ruined paintings, the work was to have been translated into a massive mosaic. However, for reasons that remain unclear, Batoni’s mosaic was never created.

Provenance

Somerville & Simpson (London, England), sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art, 1983.

Earl of Shrewsbury, Alton Towers (1838, sale 1857 as Subleyras), sold, 1983.

Citations

Arnaud, Odette. "Subleyras." In Les Peintres Français du XVIIIe Siècle, Histoire des Vies et Catalogue des Oeuvres. Louis Dimier, ed., 49-92. Paris: Les Éditions G. van Oest, 1928. Mentioned: P. 78, no. 68

Barsali, Isa Belli. "Documenti Vaticani per il Batoni." Studi Romani XXI, no. 3 (July-Sept. 1973): 366-372. Mentioned: P. 367; reproduced: Tav. LIX

Turner, Evan H. "The Year in Review for 1983." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art LXXI, no. 2 (February, 1984): 39-79. Reproduced: p. 55; Mentioned: p. 68, no. 15

Clark, Anthony M., and Edgar Peters Bowron. Pompeo Batoni: A Complete Catalogue of His Works with an Introductory Text. New York, NY: New York University Press, 1985. Mentioned: p. 28, 261; Reproduced: no. 183, pl. 171

Brown, Beverly Louise, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Terisio Pignatti, Oreste Ferrari, and Teresa Longyear. Giambattista Tiepolo: Master of the Oil Sketch. Milan, Italy: Electa, 1993. Reproduced: p. 49, fig. 18

Chong, Alan. European & American Painting in the Cleveland Museum of Art: A Summary Catalogue. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1993. Reproduced: p. 7

Groschner, Gabriele. Wen verführst Du, Thamar?: ikonographische Studien zu Gemälden der Residenzgalerie Salzburg. Salzburg, Austria: Die Residenzgalerie, 1993. Reproduced: p. 197, fig. 91

Exhibition history

Collecting Drawings in England. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) ( November 3, 1987-January 17, 1988).

The Year in Review for 1983. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 22-April 8, 1984).

Cite this page

{{cite web|title=The Fall of Simon Magus|url=https://clevelandart.org/art/1983.217|author=Pompeo Batoni|year=c. 1745- 1750|access-date=23 January 2021|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

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The Fall of Simon Magus

The Fall of Simon Magus

studio of Pompeo Batoni

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