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Immaculate Conception

Creator

Italian Artist · 1702–1759

As part of an Italian family of artists, Placido Costanzi was exposed to art at a very early age. Unlike his father and two brothers, who were gem-engravers, he became a painter. He trained with two Rococo artists, but he developed his own, more traditional, classicizing style by studying the works of Raphael and Domenichino. Early in his prolific career, he received important commissions from bot

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Date: about 1730
Medium: Oil on canvas
Culture: Italian
Department: Paintings
Institution: Getty Museum

Placido Costanzi made this *modello*, or presentation sketch, in preparation for an apse fresco in a Roman church. He may have shown this highly finished oil study to his patrons for approval before embarking on the actual architectural decoration. Costanzi incorporated the curving ribs of the apse, which would have been carved or molded gilt plaster in the church itself, into the ornamental decoration as a frame for the Virgin. Above an elaborate sunburst with her monogram, the Virgin Mary dominates the central panel. Saint Luke, holding a scroll that reads "*Ecce Virgo*" or "Behold the Virgin," occupies the left panel, and Saint John the Evangelist looks up at her from the right. Costanzi used the typical light palette, weightless putti and angels, and artificial sky of Italian Rococo architectural decorators.

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