Martyrdom of St Lawrence

religious

St Lawrence was a Christian martyr of Spanish birth who died in Rome in 258, one of the most venerated saints since the 4th century. He was ordained deacon by Pope Sixtus II and met his death shortly after the pope's own martyrdom. Tradition has it that the pope, when arrested, instructed Lawrence to give away to the poor the church's treasures, consisting of precious vessels and money, for which, as deacon, he was responsible.

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About the Artist

Valentin De Boulogne

1591 – 1632

Moise Valentin (also called Le Valentin and Valentin de Boulogne), French Caravaggesque painter active in Rome from about 1612. His life is obscure; the name 'Moise' (the French form of Moses) by which he was called was not his Christian name (which is unknown) but a corruption of the Italian form of 'monsieur'. He did, however, have one major public commission - The Martyrdom of Sts Processus and Martinian (Vatican, 1629-30), painted for St Peter's as a pendant to Poussin's Martyrdom of St Erasmus. About fifty works are attributed to him. They vary in subject - religious, mythological, and genre scenes and portraits - but the same models often seem to reappear in them, and all his work is marked by an impressively solemn, at times melancholic, dignity. He was one of the finest of Caravaggio 's followers and one of the most dedicated, still painting in his style when it had gone out of fashion. Baglione says that he died after taking a cold bath in a fountain following a drinking bout; his death was much lamented in the artistic community.

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