Currently not on view
Saint Helena, St. Peter's Basilica, Rome,
1752–56
Recto by Augustin Pajou, French, 1730–1809
after Andrea Bolgi, Italian, 1605–1656
Verso by Hubert Robert, French, 1733–1808
after Andrea Bolgi, Italian, 1605–1656
Verso by Hubert Robert, French, 1733–1808
x1948-400
Pajou spent four years at the French Academy in Rome, where students studied sculpture and architecture and drew both the ancient and modern art around them. Here, Pajou copied a sculpture of Saint Helena from Saint Peter’s Basilica, focusing on the figure’s drapery and only summarily indicating the face and the saint’s attribute, a cross. The celebrated artist Bernini designed the sculpture, which was executed by a collaborator in the 1630s for a niche in one of the piers supporting the dome of Saint Peter’s. The cross refers to the relic of the Crucifixion that Helena discovered in Jerusalem after she and her son, Emperor Constantine, converted to Christianity.
Information
Title
Saint Helena, St. Peter's Basilica, Rome
Dates
1752–56
Maker
Medium
Black chalk, brush and black ink
Dimensions
27.3 x 19 cm. (10 3/4 x 7 1/2 in.)
Credit Line
Bequest of Dan Fellows Platt, Class of 1895
Object Number
x1948-400
Place Depicted
Europe, Italy, Rome
Inscription
in graphite, verso lower right: 7383 [in circle]
in graphite, verso lower right: 20/ P. 44 | E 49 [with X above in red pencil] [in Platt hand]
Marks/Labels/Seals
Stamp in blue, verso lower left: D.F.P. [in circle] [Lugt 750a]
Culture
Type
Materials
Possibly from one of three albums of Pajou drawings that remained in possession of his son Jacques-Augustin-Catherine Pajou (1766–1828); purchased, probably in London, in 1925 by Dan Fellows Platt, stamp (L. 750a), verso, lower left, in blue.
Saint Helena: Statue by Andrea Bolgi, in S. Pietro in Vaticano, Rome
- Michel N. Benisovich, "Drawings by Sculptor Augustin Pajou in the Art Museum," Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 14, no. 1 (1955): 9–16., p. 11, fig. 4; p. 15
- "Sixteenth-to eighteenth-century French drawings from the permanent collection: a checklist of the exhibition," Record of the Art Museum, Princeton University 42, no. 1 (1983): p. 43-49., p. 45
