FRANKFURT.- One of the most celebrated artworks by the Italian Baroque painter Guido Reni (1575–1642) is currently in conservation at the Städel Museum. Christ at the Column (c. 1604) is a masterpiece by the star painter of the 17th century. The conservation is made possible through the support of funding through Bank of America’s Art Conservation Project. The conservation work sees the removal of old varnish from the painting along with retouching and overpainting that has taken place over the years.

The masterpiece is being presented to the public in a major exhibition dedicated to the rediscovery of the artist, at the Städel Museum.

“The Städel Museum stands for excellence in the field of conservation and has successfully preserved a number of important works throughout its history, providing the public with an unadulterated view of them. Bank of America has supported us on various occasions for years, and we thank the bank for its partnership in conserving the painting for the upcoming major Städel exhibition, featuring the painter star of Italian Baroque, Guido Reni,” says Philipp Demandt, Director of the Städel Museum.

“The arts are not only but especially important in challenging times for building bridges,” emphasizes Armin von Falkenhayn, Country Executive Germany and Head of Corporate and Investment Banking in the DACH region at Bank of America. “We are delighted to be able to support crucial restoration work to protect and preserve the world’s cultural heritage. Globally, Bank of America has now supported over 6,000 individual restorations in 39 countries. It is our honour to once again collaborate with the world-famous Städel Museum, which is our 9th restauration project in Germany and the 3rd at this institution. I am excited to see one of Guido Reni’s most remarkable masterpieces come back to life.”

Since 2010, Bank of America’s Art Conservation Project has supported the conservation of more than 6,000 individual pieces including paintings, sculptures, and archaeological and architectural pieces of critical importance to cultural heritage and the history of art. More than 200 projects across 39 countries have been managed by not-for-profit cultural institutions that receive grant funding to conserve historically or culturally significant works of art that are in danger of deterioration.

The conservation of Guido Reni’s painting Christ at the Column (c. 1604) serves as a prelude to the Städel Museum’s major exhibition “GUIDO RENI ‘The Divine’” (23 November 2022 to 5 March 2023), organised in cooperation with the Museo Nacional del Prado in Madrid. Despised in the 19th century on account of the aesthetic preferences of that era, later relegated to the side-lines by the one- sided concentration on his rival Caravaggio, Reni today no longer occupies the place he deserves in the public consciousness. In his own day, he was one of Europe’s most successful and most celebrated painters, sought after by such prominent patrons as the Borghese Pope Paul V, the Duke of Mantua and the Queen of England. Whether his subject matter was the Christian heaven or the world of classical mythology, Guido Reni was unmatched in his ability to translate the beauty of the divine into painting.




The Painting’s Conservation

The painting has already been on permanent display in the Gallery of Old Masters at the Städel Museum for several years. However, the aesthetic condition was poor: a yellowed layer of varnish, discoloured retouches, and old overpainting, inter alia, obscured the painting. As a result, the characteristic colouring and the spatiality of the original work has been lost.

The conservation work focuses mainly on the removal of these later interventions. It corrects previous treatments and enhances the painting’s aesthetic as a whole. Apart from the mere conservation, further research and an in-depth scientific examination of Christ at the Column are being carried out, leading to new art technological insights and a detailed re-evaluation of this masterpiece.

The Painting’s Significance

After training in his native Bologna, Guido Reni moved to Rome, the melting pot of artistic innovation from all over Europe, in 1601. In the Eternal City he soon entered in rivalry with Caravaggio. Within a period of only several years he altered his style and “transformed himself into Caravaggio”, as his early biographer Carlo Cesare Malvasia (1678) put it. That means, Reni programmatically and selectively imitated aspects of Caravaggio’s art, above all the latter’s famous chiaroscuro. However, even in this “naturalistic” period, he never gave up his obsession with elegance and beauty.

The painting Christ at the Column (c. 1604) is probably Reni’s first work in this new style. God’s son is standing at the column with his head bowed. He steps out of the darkness into the light and faces his fate, waiting for the blows of the henchmen. Christ is tied to the Column of the Flagellation – almost a “portrait” of the famous relic revered to the present day in the Roman Basilica of Santa Prassede. And it was this monastery’s guesthouse where Reni lived in those years, working for cardinals like Paolo Emilio Sfondrati and Antonio Maria Gallo. Yet the painter does not depict the Flagellation in the traditional way as a narrative including the henchmen. Instead, he directs the viewer’s attention to the figure of Christ alone, his ambiguous feelings in this moment, his strength and his faith.

The Städel Museum’s exhibition “GUIDO RENI ‘The Divine’” devotes an entire section to Reni’s engagement with Caravaggio and juxtapose the Frankfurt canvas to other masterpieces by his hand from the same period for the first time. Visitors are able to directly compare the restored painting with The Martyrdom of Saint Catherine (c. 1606; Albenga, Museo Diocesano), David with the Head of Goliath (c. 1605/06; Orléans, Musée des Beaux-Arts) and several other works.

Art-historical research by the curator of the exhibition and Head of Italian, French and Spanish Paintings before 1800, Bastian Eclercy, is accompanying the conservation project, and the results will be presented in an extensive entry in the catalogue.