San Sebastiano

In Renaissance Italy, Saint Sebastian was more than a martyr. Because he survived being shot with arrows, people prayed to him for protection from plague, which struck Italian cities every few years and was often imagined as arrows falling from the sky. That is why so many calm, isolated figures of Sebastian were painted in this period, often for a church or private devotion after an outbreak. Perugino, an Umbrian master who would soon train the young Raphael, gives him a serene face and a soft green landscape rather than agony. This panel repeats a composition Perugino used more than once, the saint bound to a column against a wide, quiet horizon.