Moses and the Brazen Serpent

Corrado Giaquinto's Moses and the Brazen Serpent is a lively compositional study and may relate to a fresco by the artist in the church of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme in Rome, one of Giaquinto's most important Roman commissions. Fresco is a highly demanding medium, as changes cannot easily be made to the painting once the day's work in plaster has dried. Thus artists had to prepare their compositions extensively before they began painting, working out every detail of the work on paper. If this drawing relates to the Santa Croce in Gerusalemme project, Giaquinto changed the composition and format considerably before executing the final fresco and the better preserved modello for the painting illustrated here.