Presentation Sketch for "The Holy Family with Saints Anne, Joachim, and John the Baptist" (for Santa Maria in Via Lata, Roma) (c. 1729): Art, History and Details

Presentation Sketch for "The Holy Family with Saints Anne, Joachim, and John the Baptist" (for Santa Maria in Via Lata, Roma) (c. 1729) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Francesco Trevisani (Italian, 1656–1746).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

During the early 1700s, Roman artists returned to fundamental Christian subjects, especially those focused on the Christ child. This work presents the Holy Family with Christ’s maternal grandparents and baby cousin, John the Baptist, stressing the importance of family relationships. Saints Anne and Joachim hold books, probably representing the Old Testament, reinforcing Christianity’s connection to the older Hebrew tradition. Trevisani’s tender visual language also looks explicitly back to Guido Reni, whose graceful approach to religious art remained immensely inspirational throughout the century.

Object facts

• Title: Presentation Sketch for "The Holy Family with Saints Anne, Joachim, and John the Baptist" (for Santa Maria in Via Lata, Roma)
• Date: c. 1729
• Creator attribution: Francesco Trevisani (Italian, 1656–1746)
• Culture: Italy
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on canvas
• Dimensions: Framed: 179 x 127.5 x 6.5 cm (70 1/2 x 50 3/16 x 2 9/16 in.); Unframed: 158 x 106.7 cm (62 3/16 x 42 in.)
• Collection: P - Italian 18th Century
• Department: European Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1974.108

Collection credit

Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• The Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art Catalogue of Paintings, Part 3: European Paintings of the 16th, 17th, and 18th Centuries. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1982.
• Lee, Sherman E. “The Year in Review for 1974.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 62, no. 3 (March 1975): 62–102.
• Olszewski, Edward J. “A Rediscovered Holy Family by Francesco Trevisani.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 64, no. 1 (January 1977): 25–36.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.