Salome Asking Herod for the Head of Saint John the Baptist

1455–60

Giovanni di Paolo (Italian, 1398–1482)

This series of panels illustrates scenes from the life of Saint John the Baptist, a prophet who foretold Jesus’s arrival as the Christian savior. The Art Institute’s collection includes six panels that were originally part of a group of 12 that possibly formed the doors of a reliquary shrine to the saint.

The narrative begins as John leaves civilization, entering the wilderness to become a hermit. In a following scene, John wears a hair shirt, a coarse undergarment symbolizing his ascetic life, as he announces that Jesus is the savior prophesied as the Agnus Dei, the Lamb of God. Subsequent panels show John’s imprisonment and violent execution at the hands of Herod, ruler of Galilee. Giovanni di Paolo related the Baptist’s complex biography with expressive figures represented multiple times to indicate their movement through highly imaginative and stylized settings.

Status: On View, Gallery 204
Department: Painting and Sculpture of Europe

Artist: Giovanni di Paolo
Title: Salome Asking Herod for the Head of Saint John the Baptist
Place: Italy (Artist's nationality:)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1455–1460
Medium: Tempera on panel
Dimensions: 69.1 × 36 cm (27 3/16 × 14 3/16 in.); Framed: 80.1 × 47.7 × 8.3 cm (31 1/2 × 18 3/4 × 3 1/4 in.)
Credit Line: Mr. and Mrs. Martin A. Ryerson Collection
Reference Number: 1933.1013
IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world. Learn more.: https://api.artic.edu/api/v1/artworks/16166/manifest.json

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New York, F. Kleinberger Galleries, Italian Primitives, 1917, no. 57.
New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Loan Exhibition of the Arts of the Italian Renaissance, May 7–September 9, 1923, no. 15.
London, Royal Academy of Arts, Exhibition of Italian Art, 1200–1900, January–March, 1930, no. 930.
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Cleveland Museum of Art, Twentieth Anniversary Exhibition, June 26–October 4, 1936, no. 139.
Art Institute of Chicago, The Children’s Museum, Explanatory Exhibition of the Panels Showing Scenes from the Life of St. John the Baptist by Giovanni di Paolo, 1939 (no cat.).
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, Arts of the Middle Ages, February 17–March 24, 1940.
Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago’s Dream A World’s Treasure: The Art Institute of Chicago, 1893-1993, 1993, no cat.

Edourd Aynard, Lyons, by 1907 [see Perkins 1907]; sold Galerie Georges Petit, Paris, December 1–4, 1913 no. 51, to Kleinberger, Paris, as agent for Martin A. Ryerson (died 1932), Chicago, 1914 [an entry for June 18, 1914, in Ryerson’s notebook reads: “Bot [sic] of Kleinberter, Paris, 6 panels by Giovanni di Paolo (purchased by him at Aynard sale for 160 000 fr + 10%);” Art Institute Archives]; on loan to the Art Institute from 1914; bequeathed to the Art Institute, 1933.

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Salome Asking Herod for the Head of Saint John the Baptist

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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Dimensions

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IIIF Manifest The International Image Interoperability Framework (IIIF) represents a set of open standards that enables rich access to digital media from libraries, archives, museums, and other cultural institutions around the world.

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