09 works, Today, December 13th, is Saint Lucia of Syracuse's day, her story, illustrated #346

Master of the Legend of Saint Lucy  (circa 1435 –1506/1509)

Legend of St Lucy, c. 1480

Oil on oak wood

Height: 79 cm (31.1 in); Width: 183 cm (72 in)

St. James Church, Bruges, Belgium

Master of the Legend of Saint Lucy (fl. 1480-1510) was an unidentified Early Netherlandish painter who worked in Bruges, a city in today's Belgium. His name comes from for an altarpiece in the church of Saint James in Bruges, which is dated 1480 and depicts three scenes from the life of Saint Lucy. Since then, twenty-five to thirty-five paintings have been attributed to the same hand. He may have trained Spanish students at his studio in Bruges. Many of his paintings are characterized by views of the city of Bruges in the background, and can be dated according to the level of construction of its belfry. He may have trained with Dieric Bouts, and was certainly influenced by Bruges' greatest artist at the time, Hans Memling. More on the Master of the Legend of Saint Lucy

Lucia of Syracuse (283–304), also called Saint Lucia, or Saint Lucy, was a Christian martyr who died during the Diocletianic Persecution.

Lucy was born of rich and noble parents about the year 283. Her father was of Roman origin, but died when she was five years old,leaving Lucy and her mother without a protective guardian. Her mother's name Eutychia seems to indicate that she came from a Greek background.

Giovanni di Bartolommeo Cristiani

Saint Lucy and Her Mother at the Shrine of Saint Agatha

Tempera on wood, gold ground

9 3/4 x 15 1/8 in. (24.8 x 38.4 cm)

The Met Fifth Avenue

Giovanni di Bartolomeo Cristiani was an Italian painter active in Pistoia and Pisa in the second half of the 14th century.

Originally from Pistoia, Cristiani is documented in Florence in 1366. His career is mainly situated in Pistoia and Pisa. His style points to a training in Pistoia. His work also shows the influence of the Florentine master Niccolò di Tommaso, who had himself worked in Pistoia. Nardo di Cione also seems to have left a mark on Cristiani's style.

He is thought by Ciampi to have been employed at the Campo Santo of Pisa in 1382. His last work, which is now lost, was the decoration of a church in Pistoia, which was begun in 1396 and finished in 1398.

Very little remains of this artist's productions, and no exact date is known of his death. In the Sacristy of San Giovanni Evangelista at Pistoia there is a painting by him of 'St. John the Baptist enthroned with Angels' (1370). A fragmentary panel by the artist is in the church of San Michele at Crespina, near Pisa. More on Giovanni di Bartolomeo Cristiani

Like many of the early martyrs, Lucy had consecrated her virginity to God, and she hoped to distribute her dowry to the poor. However, Eutychia, not knowing of Lucy's promise, and suffering from a bleeding disorder, feared for Lucy's future. She arranged Lucy's marriage to a young man of a wealthy pagan family.

Jacobello del Fiore, (1370–1439) Blue pencil.svg wikidata:Q2634352

Saint Lucia at the tomb of Saint Agatha, c. 1410

Civic Museum, Fermo

Jacobello del Fiore (c. 1370 – 1439) was a Venetian artist in the late fourteenth century and early fifteenth century. His early work is in the Late Gothic style popularized by Altichiero da Verona and Jacopo Avanzi, two of his contemporaries, while his mature work displays a local Venetian style established by the school of Paolo Veneziano, an artist and workshop proprietor with notable Byzantine inspiration in his work. This stylistic return to his roots sets him apart from Venetian contemporaries he is often associated with. During his lifetime, he received commissions primarily on the Adriatic coast and in Venice. More on Jacobello del Fiore

Saint Agatha had been martyred 52 years before during the Decian persecution. Her shrine at Catania, less than 50 miles from Syracuse, attracted a number of pilgrims; many miracles were reported to have happened through her intercession. Eutychia was persuaded to make a pilgrimage to Catania, in hopes of a cure. While there, St. Agatha came to Lucy in a dream and told her that because of her faith her mother would be cured and that Lucy would be the glory of Syracuse, as she was of Catania. 

Giovanni di Bartolomeo Cristiani  (1340–1398)

Saint Lucy Giving Alms, c. between 1366 and 1396 

Tempera on wood, gold ground

10 x 15 in. (25.4 x 38.1 cm)

Metropolitan Museum of Art

For Giovanni di Bartolommeo Cristiani, see above

With her mother cured, Lucy took the opportunity to persuade her mother to allow her to distribute a great part of her riches among the poor.

Eutychia suggested that the sums would make a good bequest, but Lucy countered, "...whatever you give away at death for the Lord's sake you give because you cannot take it with you. Give now to the true Savior, while you are healthy, whatever you intended to give away at your death."

Lorenzo Lotto, (1480–)

Saint Lucy Before the Judge, c. 1532

Oil on panel

243 × 237 cm (95.6 × 93.3 in)

Jesi Municipal Art Gallery, Palazzo Pianetti, Jesi, Italy

The picture shows the central panel of the St Lucy Altarpiece. The altarpiece was commissioned in 1523, however, the execution started only in 1528 and ended in 1532. 

Lucy's fiancé, enraged by losing her dowry, complained to the Roman consul Paschasius, who now questions Lucy about her religious beliefs and demands that she worship idols. After an angry altercation, Paschasius orders her to be removed to a brothel. More on this work

Lorenzo Lotto (c. 1480 – 1556/57) was an Italian painter, draughtsman and illustrator, traditionally placed in the Venetian school, though much of his career was spent in other North Italian cities. He painted mainly altarpieces, religious subjects and portraits. While he was active during the High Renaissance, his nervous and eccentric posings and distortions represent a transitional stage to the first Florentine and Roman Mannerists of the 16th century. More on Lorenzo Lotto

Giovanni di Bartolomeo Cristiani  (1340–1398)

Saint Lucy Resisting Efforts to Move Her , c. between 1366 and 1396 

Tempera on wood, gold ground

9 3/4 x 15 1/8 in. 

Metropolitan Museum of Art

For Giovanni di Bartolommeo Cristiani, see above

News that the patrimony and jewels were being distributed came to Lucy's betrothed, who denounced her to Paschasius, the Governor of Syracuse. Paschasius ordered her to burn a sacrifice to the emperor's image. When she refused, Paschasius sentenced her to be defiled in a brothel, but his minions were unable to move her from the place where she stood, even when they tied her with ropes and attempted to drag her with oxen. 

The Governor asked what witchcraft she used, to which she answered 'I do not use witchcraft — it is the power of God that is with me. Bring ten thousand of your men if you wish; they will not be able to move me unless God wills it.' 

Van de Kruisafneming Van Figdor 1505-1510

The Martyrdom of Saint Lucy, Circa 1505-1510

Oil on oak wood

Height: 132.4 cm (52.1 in); Width: 101.7 cm (40 in)

Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam

Saint Lucia standing on a pyre is stabbed through the neck by an executioner with a sword. Other executioners fanning the flames with bellows, left, look to authority figures. In the background scenes from the life of the saint. Rear left is Lucia for a brothel, on the right a couple making love, they also try one Lucia with a wing to drag oxen Lucia gets a priest last rites are allotted, the right, the governor Paschasius beheaded.

Van de Kruisafneming Van Figdor (1480–1500), was an Early Netherlandish painter.

He was named by Max J. Friedlander after the Austrian banker and art collector Albert Figdor for an altarpiece painting he owned and which was displayed in the Gemäldegalerie, Berlin, but which was destroyed in 1945 during World War II. This artist is sometimes also called the Master of the Martyrdom of St. Lucy after the backside of the destroyed altarpiece, which is in the collection of the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam. On stylistic grounds the painter has been called "Pseudo-Geertgen" or the pupil of Geertgen tot Sint Jans and was probably active in Haarlem.

For the similarity of the alternate name, this artist is sometimes confused with the Flemish Master of the Legend of Saint Lucy. More on Van de Kruisafneming Van Figdor

Bundles of wood were then heaped about her and set on fire, but would not burn. Finally, she met her death by the sword thrust into her throat.

Francesco del Cossa, (1436–1477)

Saint Lucy, c. 1472

Tempera, gold and wood

Height: 77.2 cm (30.3 in); Width: 56 cm (22 in)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.

Francesco del Cossa (c. 1430 – c. 1477) was an Italian Renaissance painter of the School of Ferrara. The son of a stonemason in Ferrara, little is known about his early works, although it is known that he travelled outside of Ferrara in his late twenties or early thirties.

Cossa is best known for his frescoes. One of the first records we have of him is in 1456 when he was an assistant to his father, Cristofano del Cossa, at that time employed in painting the carvings and statues on the high altar in the chapel of the bishop's palace at Ferrara. More Francesco del Cossa

Absent in the early narratives and traditions, at least until the fifteenth century, is the story of Lucia tortured by eye-gouging. According to later accounts, before she died she foretold the punishment of Paschasius and the speedy end of the persecution, adding that Diocletian would reign no more, and Maximian would meet his end. This so angered Paschasius that he ordered the guards to remove her eyes. 

Paolo Veronese, (1528–1588) 

The Martyrdom and Last Communion of Saint Lucy, circa 1582

Oil on canvas

Height: 140 cm (55.1 in); Width: 173 cm (68.1 in)

National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C

Paolo Caliari, known as Paolo Veronese (1528–1588), was an Italian Renaissance painter, based in Venice, known for large-format history paintings of religion and mythology, such as The Wedding at Cana (1563) and The Feast in the House of Levi (1573). Included with Titian, a generation older, and Tintoretto, a decade senior, Veronese is one of the “great trio that dominated Venetian painting of the cinquecento” and the Late Renaissance in the 16th century. Known as a supreme colorist, and after an early period with Mannerism, Paolo Veronese developed a naturalist style of painting, influenced by Titian.

His most famous works are elaborate narrative cycles, executed in a dramatic and colorful style, full of majestic architectural settings and glittering pageantry. His large paintings of biblical feasts, crowded with figures, painted for the refectories of monasteries in Venice and Verona are especially famous, and he was also the leading Venetian painter of ceilings. Most of these works remain in situ, or at least in Venice, and his representation in most museums is mainly composed of smaller works such as portraits that do not always show him at his best or most typical.

He has always been appreciated for "the chromatic brilliance of his palette, the splendor and sensibility of his brushwork, the aristocratic elegance of his figures, and the magnificence of his spectacle", but his work has been felt "not to permit expression of the profound, the human, or the sublime", and of the "great trio" he has often been the least appreciated by modern criticism. Nonetheless, "many of the greatest artists ... may be counted among his admirers, including Rubens, Watteau, Tiepolo, Delacroix and Renoir." More on Paolo Caliari, known as Paolo Veronese

Another version has Lucy taking her own eyes out in order to discourage a persistent suitor who admired them. This is one of the reasons that Lucy is the patron saint of those with eye illnesses. When her body was prepared for burial in the family mausoleum it was discovered that her eyes had been miraculously restored. More on Saint Lucia

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