Martyrdom of Saint Lawrence

Around 1613, Rubens was the busiest painter in Antwerp, back a few years from a long spell in Italy, and the Catholic church of the Spanish Netherlands wanted precisely this kind of picture: a saint shown mid-suffering, close enough to move an ordinary worshipper. Lawrence was a deacon of Rome, put to death in 258 by being roasted on an iron grid over hot coals. Rubens hands you the moment at full pitch. The body twists on the gridiron, the executioners heave at the fire and the iron bars, and above the smoke two angels lean down with the palm and wreath that mark a martyr. The panel later left a Brussels church for the collection of the Bavarian electors, and in 1621 the engraver Lucas Vorsterman carried the composition across Europe in print.