The Denial of Saint Peter

While the author of this painting remains unknown, the painter was evidently influenced by Bartolomeo Manfredi, one of the leading painters working in Rome in the wake of Caravaggio. The composition is inspired by Manfredi’s iconic Card Players in the Gallerie degli Uffizi, Florence, but substitutes the secular subject for a biblical scene, the Denial of Saint Peter. The artist has varied the figures but retained their arrangement close to the foreground, with the protagonist turning dramatically to look over his left shoulder, his hands rooted firmly on the table, and the other figures looking inward towards him.