The Martyrdom of St Catherine of Alexandria

Cornelis de Baellieur (attributed to) 1607 - 1671

Summary

The subject of this painting attributed to Cornelis de Baellieur is the martyrdom of Saint Catherine of Alexandria. According to Christian legend, the beautiful, erudite and devout princess angered the Emperor Maxentius by protesting about the persecution of Christians that had begun under his rule in the 4th century. He tried in vain to make her renounce her faith, but to no avail. Most famously, she was bound to a spiked wheel, which flew apart without hurting her (giving rise to the term ‘catherine-wheel'). When she was finally beheaded, milk flowed from her arteries. Her shrine is the Orthodox monastery of St Katherine in Sinai, Egypt. The action takes place in the final moments of her life, as a soldier swings the sword that will end her life. A dense crowd presses forward and the garish, blood red clothing of the figures on either side of her prefigure her destiny. Her saintly status is already assured, however: dressed in celestial colours of pink and blue, she emanates brightness, and a halo radiates around her fair head. De Baellieur, who was born and died in Antwerp, was closely associated with Frans Francken the Younger (1581-1642) and may have worked in his studio. His only signed and dated work, and his most famous, is Interior of a Collector's Cabinet, 1637, in the Musée du Louvre, Paris. Saint Catherine's ‘china doll face', slightly protruding eyes and sloping shoulders are typical of de Baellieur's style.