Spirit Guarding the Secret of the Tomb

Proof of Saint-Marceaux’s taste for Italy, Spirit Guarding the Secret of the Tomb was executed after his second stay in Italy in the early 1870s. The artist deeply admired the Florentine Renaissance and Michelangelo in particular. His Spirit is thus directly inspired by the male figures in the Sistine Chapel. The body is hunched and yet twisted in a way that recalls the compositions of the great Renaissance sculptor. With remarkably simple lines and movement, Saint-Marceaux has arranged the limbs so as to obtain a rotating movement. The figure is rolled around a funerary urn in a defiant attitude. Contrasting with the nude body, the veil stirred by the wind punctuates the volumes with areas of shade.