Detail of 'Saint Jerome' by Domenico Ghirlandaio (1448-1494)
Saint Jerome (c. 345-420), whose feast day falls on September 30th, is commemorated in this fresco by Ghirlandaio in the Florentine church of Ognissanti. The great scholar and founder of ascetic communities is remembered above all as the translator into Latin of the Hebrew scriptures and Greek New Testament. Ghirlandaio portrays the scholar saint in his study. The setting the artist imagines suggests the world of a fifteenth-century scholar-monk or perhaps of a learned lawyer, for the legal profession claimed Jerome as patron Saint. The surface of objects found in this well-furnished study, such as the grain of Jerome’s wooden writing desk or the metallic gleam of the candlestick and scissors, evoke material reality unmistakably. Splashes of ink are spattered around the ink-wells attached to Jerome’s desk. Such anecdotal details help us identify with the figure who gazes out towards the viewer. Jerome appears in a moment of introspection; his pen poised while in his other hand he holds a folded piece of paper. Ghirlandaio invites us to wonder about the cause of the Saint’s break from writing. Is he perhaps recalling his spiritual friends and companions, Paula and Eustochia? We find a clue to Jerome’s pensive attitude in the Greek inscription on the paper nailed to the shelf at his right. The text from Psalm reads “O God have mercy on me according to your pity”.
Art Guide Resource
The 2014 Art Guide has been compiled by Claire Renkin, well-known art historian and lecturer at Yarra Theological Union and has been recorded by Dr. Rachael Kohn, author and public speaker, most well known for her ABC Radio National program, 'The Spirit of Things'. Music by Chris Zabriskie (chriszabriskie.com). Artworks © Bridgeman Images.
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