Elijah fed by Ravens by Guercino

Elijah fed by Ravens by Guercino (1620)

The artist: Guercino

Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, known as Guercino, was born in 1591 in Cento, between Bologna and Ferrara. His nickname, "the little squinter", came from his crossed eyes. He was largely self-taught, apprenticed at about sixteen to the Bolognese painter Benedetto Gennari, and was praised early by Ludovico Carracci. In 1621 Pope Gregory XV, a Bolognese, called him to Rome, where he painted the Aurora ceiling at the Villa Ludovisi. After the pope's death in 1623 he returned to Cento, and in 1642, after the death of Guido Reni, he moved his workshop to Bologna. He died there in 1666.

Historical context of the artwork

The picture was painted in 1620, the year before Guercino went to Rome. The National Gallery records that it was commissioned by Cardinal Jacopo Serra, papal legate of Ferrara. By 1655 it was in the collection of the Barberini family in Rome, where it stayed until the collector Denis Mahon bought it in 1936; the National Gallery bought it in 2009.

Religious significance

The story is in the First Book of Kings, chapter 17 (in the Vulgate numbering, the Third Book of Kings). During the drought, God sends Elijah away to "hide thyself by the torrent of Carith": "there thou shalt drink of the torrent: and I have commanded the ravens to feed thee there". So "the ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning, and bread and flesh in the evening, and he drank of the torrent" (3 Kings 17:3–6, Douay-Rheims).

Guercino points to the text in the picture itself. A stone block at the right is inscribed REG. III CAP. XVII, "Kings III, chapter 17".

Symbolism and iconography

Elijah, a large, white-bearded old man, sits on a rock with one bare leg drawn up, in a brown tunic torn at the shoulder and a heavy blue-violet mantle that he holds out in both hands. He turns his face upwards. The National Gallery writes that he sits awkwardly, "his aged face turned expectantly toward the birds above him", and that the birds stand for both physical and spiritual nourishment as the prophet puts his faith in God's command.

The ravens are hard to see against the dark trees and night sky, but the food they carry catches the light: a reddish piece of meat near the top of the picture and a cluster of round loaves at the right, just above Elijah's head. At his feet lie an empty bowl and an unrolled scroll, and a stream runs past at the lower left. The museum reads the empty bowl and the torn clothing as reminders of his hunger and hardship in the wilderness.

Artistic techniques

The light falls from the left onto Elijah's face, his arms and his bare leg and foot, and leaves most of the landscape in shadow. The colours are few: the blue-violet mantle, the brown tunic and white shirt, the dark greens of the trees and the deep blue of the night sky. The National Gallery notes the strong directional lighting and restrained colour as typical of Guercino's early style, and describes the figure as over life-size, painted with realism rather than idealised.

The painting today

The canvas measures 195 by 156.5 centimetres and is in the National Gallery, London (NG6612), in Room 32.

About this print

Made from a photograph of the whole canvas, in its upright format, from the loaves in the trees at the top to Elijah's bare foot, the bowl and the scroll at the bottom.

Sources: The National Gallery, London, NG6612 · Wikimedia Commons · Wikipedia, "Guercino" · 3 Kings (1 Kings) 17:1–6 (Douay-Rheims)