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Religious paintings of the early seventeenth century often focused on
the visionary experiences of the saints, highlighting moments of ecstatic
union with God. Such images suited the deeply spiritual and mystical religion
propounded by the Catholic Church during the Counter-Reformation.
  Saint
Jerome, frequently depicted in paintings of the period, experienced several
such visions. During his years as a hermit in the wilderness, he was visited
by a trumpeting angel who warned him of the Last Judgment, and thus was
often shown as a penitent saint. Alternatively, as one of the first Fathers
of the Church, and the translator of the Bible from Hebrew into Latin,
he was represented as a scholar in a study. Simon Vouet’s Saint
Jerome and the Angel combines these two aspects by representing him
as a bare-chested hermit seated in a scholar’s study, wearing his
red cardinal’s robe. The objects on his desk -- a skull, hourglass,
and candle -- are all symbols of the transience of earthly life. Jerome
looks toward the angel, whose message about the Last Judgment provides
another reminder of human mortality, and the role of repentance in attaining
the spiritual afterlife.
 In
Lodovico Carracci’s Dream of Saint Catherine of Alexandria
(c. 1593), Catherine is shown asleep, her elbow resting on a book inscribed
in Greek, The Gospel of Christ. In the corner next to her is a
fragment of her attribute, the spiked wheel on which she was tortured.
According to Catherine’s legend, Christ appeared to her as she slept,
accompanied by the Virgin Mary and by angels, and placed a ring of betrothal
on her finger. Carracci’s representation of the mystical vision has
great immediacy, the direct gaze and robust body of the Christ Child contrasting
with the generalized and softened features of the sleeping saint.
 Another
female saint whose legend tells of visionary experiences is Saint Cecilia,
who enjoyed unprecedented popularity at the beginning of the seventeenth
century following the discovery, in 1599, of remains believed to be hers.
In Gentileschi and Lanfranco’s Saint Cecilia and an Angel,
the patron saint of music is shown playing her organ, while an attentive
angel holds her music. As Cecilia concentrates intently on the keyboard,
she seems unaware of the angel’s presence. According to legend an
angel appeared to her prior wedding and granted her permission to remain
a virgin. In this painting, however, the angel acts as a reminder of her
heavenly inspiration. The closely observed expression and dress give the
painting such a strong sense of realism that only the angel’s wings
remove the characters from the realm of the everyday.
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