The Redemption

Teofilo Patini (Castel di Sangro 1840 - Naples 1906)

Executed in the very early Twentieth century for his friend Luigi Frasca, the painting recently acquired by the National Museum of Abruzzo is a replica, in a smaller format and with slight variations, of the large canvas commissioned to the artist by Marquis Raffaele Cappelli for the church of Santa Maria dei Raccomandati in San Demetrio ne’ Vestini, province of L’Aquila.
The scene shows a crowd of half-naked men and women proceeding with an ascending rhythm from the flames of hell, which redden the bottom right-hand corner of the painting, towards the top of a rocky ridge on which stands a salvific cross, the centre and focus of the whole representation. Surrounded by a group of people kneeling in an act of prayer, a seated young man turns his ecstatic gaze towards a butterfly-winged maiden who embraces the feet of the cross. Over them, a group of angels pour purifying liquid while on the left, the transparent soul of the young man ascends to heaven.
Already at the time of the painting’s realisation, it was immediately evident that underneath the religious theme there were in fact purely Masonic meanings.
A Freemason since 1896, in fact, Patini wanted to represent in this painting the belief that only with Virtue, impersonated by the young man rising from the fire of earthly passions and the assistance of Reason/Psychic, symbolised by the winged maiden, humanity can attain true Wisdom.
The work was purchased by the National Museum of Abruzzo in 2022.