About the Artwork
Giovanni Paolo Panini, an architect and painter who taught perspective at the French Academy in Rome, glorified that city in countless realistic views of its monuments as well as in architectural fantasies in which imaginary ruins and identifiable buildings coexist, challenging the viewer to differentiate reality from fiction. This interior of Saint Peter's Basilica is one of approximately thirty depictions made by Panini of the Renaissance and Baroque church that had been designed by Michelangelo and Gian Lorenzo Bernini, among others. At the very end of the light-filled interior stands Bernini’s famous additions to basilica, the bronze and gilded canopy (baldachin) and Chair of Saint Peter (a modello of which also exists in the Detroit Institute of Art’s collections). What truly enlivens the painting, however, are the small figures scattered throughout the vast basilica. Shown kneeling in reverence, admiring the sights, or animatedly conversing with each other, these individualized men and women of all ages and walks of life offer a fascinating slice of contemporary Rome.
Interior of St. Peter's, Rome
1750
Giovanni Paolo Panini
1691-1765
Italian
Unknown
Oil on canvas
Unframed: 52 1/4 × 57 5/16 inches (132.7 × 145.6 cm) Framed: 64 × 68 1/4 × 5 inches (162.6 × 173.4 × 12.7 cm)
Paintings
European Painting
Gift of Mrs. Edgar R. Thom
56.43
This work is in the public domain.
Markings
Signed and dated, at bottom of left column: I. P. PANINI/ROMAE/1750
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Provenance
the artist, Giovanni Paolo Panini
1750, purchased by William Holbech for (Farnborough Hall, Warwickshire, England)
by descent to Ronald H. A. Holbech (Farnborough Hall, Warwickshire, England)
August 1929, purchased by (Savile Gallery Ltd., London, England)
1930-1935, purchased by (Knoedler & Co., Inc., New York, New York, USA)
after 1935, (Seligmann, Rey & Co., New York, New York, USA)
by 1949, Mr. and Mrs. Edgar R. Thom (Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, USA)
1956-present, gift to the Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit, Michigan, USA)
For more information on provenance and its important function in the museum, please visit:
Provenance pageExhibition History
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The exhibition history of a number of objects in our collection only begins after their acquisition by the museum, and may reflect an incomplete record.
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Wenham, Edward. "The Collector." International Studio 95, no. 394 (March 1930): 55–58, p. 58 (ill.).
"[Advertisement] M. Knoedler & Co. Inc, Pictures by Old & Modern Masters." Burlington Magazine 66, no. 383 (February 1935): p. xvii (ill.).
Masterpieces of Painting from Detroit Private Collections. Exh. cat., Detroit Institute of Arts. Detroit, 1949, unpaginated, cat. 24.
"Recent Accessions of Paintings." Bulletin of the Detroit Institute of Arts 36, no. 1 (1956–1957): 18–20, pp. 18–19 (ill.).
Richardson, E[dgar] P. "Director's Report." Bulletin of the Detroit Institute of Arts 36, no. 2 (1956–1957): 43–46, pp. 45, 50.
Arisi, Ferdinando. Gian Paolo Panini. Piacenza, 1961, pp. 140–141, 197, no. 212, fig. 266 (ill.).
Paintings in the Detroit Institute of Arts: A Check List of the Paintings Acquired Before June, 1965. Detroit, 1965, p. 84.
Fredericksen, Burton B. and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth-Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, MA, 1972, pp. 156, 495, 580.
An Aspect of Collecting Taste. Exh. cat., Stair Sainty Matthiesen. New York, 1986, pp. 32–34, no. 10 (ill.).
Arisi, Ferdinando. Gian Paolo Panini e fasti della Roma del '700. Rome, 1986, pp. 213, 331, 434, no. 407 (ill.), 453.
Kiene, Michael. Panini: Exposition-dossier du département des Peintures. Exh. cat., Musée du Louvre, Paris, 1992, p. 139. [see no. 37]
Giovanni Paolo Panini 1691–1765. Exh. cat., Palazzo Gotico. Piacenza, 1993, p. 84.
Henshaw, Julia, ed. A Visitor's Guide: The Detroit Institute of Arts. Detroit, 1995, p. 186 (ill.).
Grazia, Diane de and Eric Garberson. Italian Paintings of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries. Exh. cat., National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1996, p. 198, note 12.
Mann, Judith Walker. "Baroque Into Rococo: Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Italian Paintings." Saint Louis Art Museum Bulletin 22, no. 2 (1997): 1–63, pp. 13, 56.
Bandes, Susan J. Pursuits and Pleasures: Baroque Paintings from the Detroit Institute of Arts. Exh. cat., Dennos Museum Center, Kalamazoo Art Museum, Kresge Art Museum, Muskegon Museum of Art. Battle Creek, 2003, pp. 8, 10-11, 30, 31 (ill.).
Bissell, R. Ward, Andria Derstine and Dwight Miller. Masters of Italian Baroque Painting: The Detroit Institute of Arts. London, 2005, pp. 10, 140–141, no. 46. (ill.).
Derstine, Andria. "The Detroit Institute of Arts and Italian Baroque Painting." In Buying Baroque: Italian Seventeenth-Century Paintings Come to America, ed. Edgar Peters Bowron. University Park, 2017, p. 98.
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Credit Line for Reproduction
Giovanni Paolo Panini, Interior of St. Peter's, Rome, 1750, oil on canvas. Detroit Institute of Arts, Gift of Mrs. Edgar R. Thom, 56.43.
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