Louvre Stigmata Panel

St Francis Receiving the Stigmata is a fresco by Giotto from around the end of the 13th century which would eventually make its way to the Louvre in France.

The work in Paris is a large, portable panel painting: tempera and gold on poplar, measuring 313 × 163 centimetres. Its pointed top, painted frame and three lower narrative compartments belong to an object made for a church interior. The Louvre currently dates it broadly to 1300–1325. Those material facts distinguish it from the frescoes of the same subject at Assisi and Florence. ^{[1] [2]}

Painting Explained

The overall artwork features scenes from the life of St Francis of Assisi, with his receipt of the Stigmata being the larger piece and from where the overall project received its title.

The saint is shown praying on Mount Alverno whilst Christ appears from the right hand side. Christ is wounded, through which light reflects on the saint below, surprising him. The light is emitted directly from his injured hands and feet, creating a diagonal direction of lines towards the saint. Saint Francis raises his hands in surprise.

The fine lines connecting the two figures represent the transmission of the wounds, rather than light reflected from an injured body. They make a precise relationship visible across the gold ground: Christ's wounds become the source of corresponding marks on Francis. Michael Viktor Schwarz draws particular attention to this cause-and-effect structure in the painting. ^[22]

Francis kneels beneath the heavenly figure, with the connecting lines retained. Shonagon / Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain Mark1.0. Image source. Public domain. Proportionally reduced reproduction; no colour or content enhancement.

The six-winged vision

The apparition has a human face, outstretched arms and exposed feet, enclosed within six dark wings. Two rise sharply above the head, two spread behind the arms, and two descend around the body. Their arrangement gives the figure the outline of a cross while preserving its extraordinary winged form. Francis looks upward from the opposite corner, his open palms turned toward the apparition. The two faces meet across a space traversed by the rays.

The mountain is La Verna, called Alverna in Bonaventure's Life of Saint Francis. In chapter XIII.3, the saint sees a six-winged seraph containing the form of a crucified man. Joy at the vision and grief at the suffering coexist in the narrative; when the vision disappears, the likeness of the wounds remains upon his body. Bonaventure describes marks on the hands and feet and a wound in the right side. His account supplies a theological and narrative framework for the picture; it is a medieval saint's life, rather than independent verification of a supernatural event. ^[23]

Giotto brings the apparition and its bodily consequence into one sustained encounter. The painter does not need successive scenes showing the saint before and after receiving the wounds. Instead, the connecting lines hold cause and consequence together. Francis's habit gives the kneeling body substantial weight: the cloth stretches across his raised knee, gathers at the waist beneath a pale cord and pools in thick folds near the ground. Against this enveloping garment, the bare palms and feet become particularly exposed. The miracle is made legible through the ordinary vulnerability of a human body.

The artist then decorates the background with his rocky landscapes and touches of architecture which featured in so many of his paintings.

The rocks form a steep, narrow stage. Their pale faces break into angular shelves, with darker crevices opening at the left and small trees rooted at improbable heights. Leaves gather in distinct rounded clusters; slender trunks and projecting roots interrupt the stone. The vegetation makes this place feel inhabited by living things even as its abrupt slopes suggest the difficulty of retreating there. Schwarz singles out these trees and their shaded foliage as an unusually attentive part of the painting. ^[24]

There are two small chapels, placed on opposite sides of Francis. Their white walls, red architectural accents and dark entrances give the mountain recognisable places of worship. Look into the doorway at the left: part of a painted cross can be seen inside. Above the other chapel's entrance is a tiny image of the Virgin and Child. These reduced devotional images accompany the enormous sacred encounter taking place outside. The contrast in scale allows the landscape to contain both familiar acts of worship and the exceptional vision that dominates the panel.

The three items below, known as predellas, cover the dream of St Francis supporting a church about to collapse, the pope approving the rule of the Franciscans and across on the right is the saint preaching to birds, to whom God's path should also be followed.

The dream belongs to Pope Innocent III. Its threatened building is the Lateran basilica, and Francis appears within the pope's vision as the man who prevents its collapse. This distinction matters because the predella connects the saint's mission to papal recognition of his community. ^[25]

Giotto completed a large amount of work in Assisi, covering elements of both the upper and lower church, including a series on St Francis. For the artwork shown here, he would cover the saint for a church in Pisa. This delightful piece is over three metres in height and makes use of large amounts of golden leaf paint, helping it to make a great impact.

The golden surface is gilding, made with gold leaf, rather than a yellow or metallic paint. Tempera supplies the coloured figures and landscape on the wooden support. ^[2] Gold surrounds the rocks without becoming a blue atmospheric sky; it also continues through the narrow spaces between the predella scenes. The surface holds the whole ensemble together while the painter varies the scale and density of its narratives.

This beauty attracted French interest and the item was taken without permission and gifted to the Louvre in France, along with a number of other notable items of Italian art. Over time, many have been returned, but St Francis Receiving the Stigmata remains in France and is one of the few Giotto paintings to be on display outside of the artist's native country.

The Louvre records a Napoleonic seizure: the panel was removed in October 1812 and reached the museum in 1813. The term “gifted” therefore needs qualification. Its recorded itinerary runs from San Francesco in Pisa to San Nicola, then to the Camposanto deposit before removal to France. Vasari had described it near the high altar of San Francesco in 1568; its precise original position is less certain. ^[1]

Supporting Predellas

A predella sits at the bottom of the artwork, featuring three small portraits that aim to support the larger composition that sits above. This technique of placing several smaller frescoes below a much larger one can be seen in several other Giotto paintings and was also common in other Renaissance artist's oeuvre, including Fra Angelico .

Here the lower strip is one predella containing three narrative scenes painted on panel. “Portraits” and “frescoes” are loose descriptions of these compartments: each shows an episode with several actors and a setting. Their arrangement invites the viewer to move from a dream, through a formal audience, to an outdoor sermon.

The purpose of predellas was to allow an artist to expand upon a theme, normally related to the Bible, but without distracting too much from the main artwork. This is similar to the use of side panels in a triptych, but predellas would be smaller and more akin to a pattern of paintings that connect to the same main theme.

Innocent III's dream

At the left, the church tilts toward Francis, whose shoulder and arms brace its failing structure. His slanting body makes the act of support immediately understandable. On the other side of the compartment, the sleeping pope lies beneath a richly decorated canopy. Curtains, patterned hangings and the bright red bedclothes turn his chamber into a place of conspicuous authority. The threatened building and the dreamer occupy different zones within a single field.

An upright, haloed Saint Peter appears beside the pope's bed. His pointing hand helps connect the sleeper with the action beyond the chamber. Peter is a significant addition to Bonaventure's telling: the text describes the dream and the pope's recognition of Francis without placing the apostle at the bedside. Schwarz proposes that Peter's presence gave the image particular resonance in Pisa, where traditions associated the apostle with the city's early Christian history. This is an interpretation of the painting's local address, rather than a surviving instruction from its patron. ^[26]

The three Louvre predella scenes beneath the principal Stigmatisation. Shonagon / Wikimedia Commons / Public Domain Mark1.0. Image source. Public domain. Proportionally reduced reproduction; no colour or content enhancement.

Approval of the Franciscan rule

In the middle scene, architecture replaces the unstable structure of the dream with an orderly chamber. The coffered ceiling and repeated arches frame two groups. Francis and the kneeling friars approach from the left; the pope, distinguished by red clothing, faces them from the right amid his attendants. The central exchange remains clear despite the crowded assembly, because the surrounding heads and shoulders lead toward the meeting between the saint and the seated pontiff.

The subject concerns Innocent III's early approval of Francis's way of life and preaching. It should be distinguished from the later confirmation of the final rule by Honorius III in 1223. Bonaventure narrates these separately, in III.10 and IV.11. The distinction allows the dream and audience to form a coherent pair: the pope recognises in Francis the poor man who will sustain the Church, then authorises the community's mission. ^{[25] [27]}

Schwarz observes how large and emphatic the figures are in relation to these small compartments. It is an effective solution to the difficulty of making a crowded story readable below the great figure of Francis. The audience is compressed, yet the lowered knees, inclined heads and extended hands retain the force of public actions. ^[28]

The sermon to the birds

The third scene opens out beneath a leafy tree. Francis bends toward a congregation of birds, accompanied by a second friar. His long hand reaches into the open gold space above them, while birds on the ground turn their heads and others approach through the air. Their varied silhouettes reward a closer look without requiring the viewer to identify every species. A small gathering becomes an attentive audience.

Bonaventure places this episode after Francis has sought counsel about whether he should devote himself exclusively to prayer or go out to preach. Clare and Silvester support the preaching mission. The birds' sermon then praises God's provision of wings, clothing and food; their attentive behaviour and departure after a blessing complete the account. ^[29] Here its position beside the papal audience gives Francis two very different congregations. The order's sanctioned preaching extends beyond the formal room into the living world. More discussion of the motif appears in Giotto's Sermon to the Birds.

Attribution

Giotto also produced several triptychs as an alternative way to laying out related themes as part of an adjoined series. There is little documentation on this piece compared to several others but the general conscencus amongst art historians is that this was certainly the work of Giotto, perhaps with the support of his highly trained studio.

Giotto gave this piece his typical signature (Opus Iocti Florentini), but even with that some had earlier doubted whether it was truly his work or not. This was an artist who preferred to sign the frame rather than fresco itself. It is now standard practice to place one's signature in the bottom left or right corner of a canvas.

The inscription reads OPUS IOCTI FLORENTINI: the work of Giotto the Florentine. It runs along the lower framing member, beneath the painted scenes. Schwarz and Pia Theis list it among Giotto's surviving panel signatures and note the assertion of Florentine identity on works destined for churches outside Florence. It is valuable evidence of authorship, although it does not identify the person responsible for every stage of preparation, gilding or painting. ^[30] The statement about signing “rather than fresco” also needs this material distinction: this particular signature accompanies a wooden painting.

Date, patron and the Assisi comparison

The signed panel provides a firm point of reference in arguments about the Franciscan frescoes at Assisi. Several subjects and arrangements recur there, especially the three episodes shown in the Louvre predella. Resemblance alone cannot settle which version came first, or prove that every related fresco was painted by the same hand. The attribution and chronology of the Upper Church cycle remain disputed.

Schwarz argues for the Louvre panel as a source for the related Assisi scenes and proposes a date around 1307–1308. His reasoning depends on a larger reconstruction of the order in which Giotto and other painters worked. It is a specific scholarly position within that debate; the Louvre's wider 1300–1325 range remains the appropriate museum date to report. ^[24] The Assisi Stigmatisation and the Stigmatisation associated with the Bardi Chapel are separate wall paintings, each requiring its own examination.

Small shields on the frame introduce a further question about ownership and patronage. The Louvre records two identifications of their heraldry: the Ughi, a Florentine family exiled in Pisa, and the Pisan merchant family Cinquini. Schwarz favours the latter connection and discusses possible members of the family, but neither the visible shields nor the signature establishes a named individual commissioner beyond dispute. ^{[1] [24]} Keeping that uncertainty open allows the object to retain its securely Pisan history without attaching a more precise biography to it than the evidence supports.

Influence of Giotto

Giotto would play a significant role in bridging the gap between art of the Middle Ages and encouraging the future styles found in the Italian-led Renaissance. He was one of a number of artists whose work would influence and inspire those that followed throughout the various stages of the Renaissance era. Related artists who also played a role in developing Italian and European art in or around this time included Masaccio , Annibale Carracci , Giovanni Bellini , Andrea Mantegna and Gian Lorenzo Bernini .

These names belong to successive generations: Masaccio worked in the fifteenth century, Bellini and Mantegna belong chiefly to that century, and Carracci and Bernini to much later periods. They illustrate the long reach of Italian art rather than a circle of Giotto's contemporaries.

The Louvre panel offers a more immediate way to understand Giotto's achievement. Its figures inhabit an unmistakably sacred gold field while remaining heavy, responsive bodies. Francis's raised hands answer the outstretched hands above; the weight of his kneeling form anchors a meeting that has no ordinary earthly counterpart. Below, a shoulder supports a church, hands formalise an institutional relationship, and a preacher's gesture gathers birds into an audience. Across these changes of scale, physical actions carry the meaning. The great apparition becomes the culmination of a life made visible through particular encounters.

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