Mattia Preti, 'The Marriage at Cana', about 1655-60
About the work
Overview
This crowded banquet scene shows Christ’s first miracle (John 2: 1–10). He, his mother and the disciples were invited to a wedding feast at Cana in Galilee. When the wine ran out, Mary told her son and he asked to have six stone jars filled with water. When tasted the water was found to be wine of the finest quality. Christ is seated at the right next to his mother, who has told the servants to do Christ’s bidding. The astonished steward — probably the man in red on the left – exclaimed: ‘Thou hast kept the best wine till last ’.
A great narrative painter, Mattia Preti vividly conveys the emotional drama of the episode. In the foreground, servants are decanting the miraculous wine, while the man seated next to Mary lifts his hand in astonishment. In the centre of the composition an exquisite goblet is held out by the steward, into which a Black servant pours a golden liquid.
Key facts
Details
- Full title
- The Marriage at Cana
- Artist
- Mattia Preti
- Artist dates
- 1613 - 1699
- Date made
- about 1655-60
- Medium and support
- oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 203.2 × 226 cm
- Acquisition credit
- Bought, 1966
- Inventory number
- NG6372
- Location
- Not on display
- Collection
- Main Collection
Provenance
Additional information
This painting is included in a list of works with incomplete provenance from 1933–1945; for more information see Whereabouts of paintings 1933–1945.
Text extracted from the ‘Provenance’ section of the catalogue entry in Michael Levey, ‘National Gallery Catalogues: The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Italian Schools’, London 1986; for further information, see the full catalogue entry.
Bibliography
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1730L. Pascoli, Le vite de' pittori, scultori et architetti moderni, Rome 1730
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1742B. De Dominici, Vite de' pittori, scultori ed architetti napoletani, Naples 1742
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1788P.A. Orlandi, Abecedario pittorico, Bologna 1788
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1840B. De Dominici, Vite dei pittori, scultori ed architetti napoletani, 6th edn, 4 vols, Naples 1840
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1845F. Baldinucci, Notizie dei professori del disegno da Cimabue in qua, ed. F. Ranalli, 5 vols, Florence 1845
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1907U. Thieme and F. Becker (eds), Allgemeines Lexikon der bildenden Künstler von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, 37 vols, Leipzig 1907
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1929V. Mariani, Mattia Preti a Malta, Rome 1929
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1959C. Refice Taschetta, Mattia Preti, Brindisi 1959
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1962E.K. Waterhouse, Italian Baroque Painting, London 1962
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1967The National Gallery, The National Gallery: January 1965 - December 1966, London 1967
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1970M. Preti, The Order of St. John in Malta (exh. cat. St. John's Museum, 1970), Valletta 1970
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1971M. Levey, The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Italian Schools, London 1971
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1972A. Pelaggi (ed.), Mattia Preti ed il seicento italiano col catalogo delle opere, Catanzaro 1972
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1976E.K. Waterhouse, Roman Baroque Painting: A List of the Principal Painters and Their Works in and Around Rome, With an Introductory Essay, Oxford 1976
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1980J.T. Spike, Italian Baroque Paintings from New York Private Collections (exh. cat. Princeton Art Museum, 17 April - 7 September 1980), Princeton 1980
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1982Whitfield and J. Martineau (eds), Painting in Naples 1606-1705: From Caravaggio to Giordano (exh. cat. Royal Academy of Arts, 2 October - 12 December 1982), London 1982
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1983M. Helston, Spanish and Later Italian Paintings, London 1983
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1986Levey, Michael, National Gallery Catalogues: The Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Italian Schools, London 1986
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1987G. Hersey, 'Mattia Preti, 1613-1699', in Yale University Art Gallery, A Taste for Angels: Neapolitian Painting in North American Collections, 1650-1750, New Haven 1987, pp. 83-110
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1989J.D. Clifton and J.T. Spike, 'Mattia Preti's Passage to Naples: A Documented Chronology, 1650-1660', Storia dell'arte, LXV, 1989, pp. 45-68
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1989J.T. Spike, 'Mattia Preti's Pictorial Career', in E. Corace et al., Mattia Preti, Rome 1989, pp. 15-50
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1994A. Thomas, An Illustrated Dictionary of Narrative Painting, London 1994
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1996'Mattia Preti', in J. Turner (ed.), The Dictionary of Art, London 1996, vol. 25, pp. 562-5
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2001
C. Baker and T. Henry, The National Gallery: Complete Illustrated Catalogue, London 2001
About this record
If you know more about this painting or have spotted an error, please contact us. Please note that exhibition histories are listed from 2009 onwards. Bibliographies may not be complete; more comprehensive information is available in the National Gallery Library.