Ecstasy of St Margaret of Cortona
by LANFRANCO, Giovanni, Oil on canvas, 230 x 185 cm
During the Counter-Reformation, ecstasy may have suggested surrender to the Church, while the emphasis on the body suited Baroque ambitions to convey sculpture in paint. Canonized in 1728, Margaret may have had an earlier local cult: this painting was for a church in her native Cortona.