PROVENANCE: E. Silberman, 1951; BJU, 1951.

Bacchiacca’s mentors were his master, Perugino, and his friend, Andrea del Sarto. He specialized in small-figure compositions, often borrowing elements from the works of other Renaissance artists. In this painting, Bacchiacca adapts the figure of John from a background figure in Fra Bartolommeo’s Creation of Eve, and the background from the etched landscapes of Albrecht Dürer. Traditional symbols representing Christ in this painting include the reed cross, the rock from which water flows, and the water itself.

Leonardo da Vinci and Raphael were two of the first painters to paint John the Baptist as a young man in the wilderness. Soon, similar paintings began to appear in many artists’ studios. Bacchiacca’s St. John, painted just a few years after Raphael’s, illustrates the rapid spread of the subject’s popularity.