Beholding Violence: A Conference on Medieval and Early Modern Culture

Verrocchio’s Beheading of St John the Baptist relief (1478-80, installed 1483, Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Florence) is a highly unusual treatment of a popular subject. Focusing on the moment just prior to the Baptist’s beheading, rather the act itself, Verrocchio depicted the scene in a highly performative manner. Despite the event’s obvious gruesome potential, Verrocchio rendered the moment before like a festival performance with figures expressing their emotions through dance-like poses. What is the significance of showing this particular moment and its theatrical style? And what responses was it seeking to invoke in Renaissance viewers?

For his telling of the story, Verrocchio may have turned to contemporary sacra rappresentazioni, including his own experiences of watching such performances, as the Baptist’s Beheading was a popular subject. One particularly renowned production was held in 1451 when an estimated 50,000 viewers turned out to watch it in the meadow outside the Porta alla Giustizia. This performance was probably put on by members of the compagnia del Tempio, a confraternity dedicated to providing spiritual solace to prisoners condemned to death. Though not a member himself, Verrocchio had interesting ties with this confraternity as they rented a room from him in his house and passed his home during their regular processions accompanying the condemned to the gallows. Did Verrocchio’s own experiences as a witness of their processions, performances and meetings in his house impact on his representation of the Beheading of St John the Baptist?

Verrocchio’s peculiar representation of the subject can also be read in the light of his own experiences as a criminal: in 1452 he killed a youth in a rock-throwing incident near the church of Sant’Ambrogio. The death was later deemed accidental but the role of the artist as criminal provides a fascinating context within which to consider the role of guilt, violence and redemption in Renaissance society and how these issues were realized in the representational arts.



	Christina Nielson (Andrew W. Mellon Curatorial Fellow, Frick Collection) “The Renaissance criminal mind: guilt, violence and redemption in Verrocchio’s Beheading of St John the Baptist” Verrocchio’s Beheading of St John the Baptist relief (1478-80, installed 1483, Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Florence) is a highly unusual treatment of a popular subject. Focusing on the moment just prior to the Baptist’s beheading, rather the act itself, Verrocchio depicted the scene in a highly performative manner. Despite the event’s obvious gruesome potential, Verrocchio rendered the moment before like a festival performance with figures expressing their emotions through dance-like poses. What is the significance of showing this particular moment and its theatrical style? And what responses was it seeking to invoke in Renaissance viewers? For his telling of the story, Verrocchio may have turned to contemporary sacra rappresentazioni, including his own experiences of watching such performances, as the Baptist’s Beheading was a popular subject. One particularly renowned production was held in 1451 when an estimated 50,000 viewers turned out to watch it in the meadow outside the Porta alla Giustizia. This performance was probably put on by members of the compagnia del Tempio, a confraternity dedicated to providing spiritual solace to prisoners condemned to death. Though not a member himself, Verrocchio had interesting ties with this confraternity as they rented a room from him in his house and passed his home during their regular processions accompanying the condemned to the gallows. Did Verrocchio’s own experiences as a witness of their processions, performances and meetings in his house impact on his representation of the Beheading of St John the Baptist? Verrocchio’s peculiar representation of the subject can also be read in the light of his own experiences as a criminal: in 1452 he killed a youth in a rock-throwing incident near the church of Sant’Ambrogio. The death was later deemed accidental but the role of the artist as criminal provides a fascinating context within which to consider the role of guilt, violence and redemption in Renaissance society and how these issues were realized in the representational arts.