Elijah (Lorenzetto)
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| Artist | Lorenzetto, Raffaello da Montelupo |
| Year | 1520s |
| Type | Statue |
| Location | Chigi Chapel, Rome |
The statue of Elijah is a marble sculpture by Lorenzetto in the niche to the right of the entrance in the Chigi Chapel, the Basilica of Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome. The sculptor followed the original designs of his mentor, Raphael, who was the architect of the chapel. The statue was finished by his pupil, Raffaello da Montelupo.
The statue of Prophet Elijah was part of the original decorative scheme of the chapel by Raphael. The main iconographic themes in the funerary chapel of Agostino Chigi was resurrection and ascension of the soul to heaven. The two statues of Jonah and Elijah could be interpreted in this context: Prophet Jonah is the prototype of the Christ of the Resurrection, while Elijah of the Christ of the Ascension. In the Old Testament "Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven" on a chariot of fire (2 Kings 2:11). But Giorgio Vasari emphasized another aspect of Elijah's story in his description:
"...an Elijah, living by Grace, with his cruse of water and his bread baked in the ashes, under the juniper-tree."
Fabio Chigi repeated this in a letter. The statue was carved by Lorenzetto, Raphael's pupil, but unlike its counterpart, the statue of Jonah and the whale it was far from being finished at the time when Raphael died in 1520, and consequently the final version could be more removed from his original (lost) designs. A young assistant sculptor, Raffaello da Montelupo was working on the statue in the years before the Sack of Rome (1527). Both statues remained in Lorenzetto's workshop for a long time as Vasari records in his Lives.
Lorenzetto died in 1541 but ten years later, in 1552 Lorenzo Leone Chigi paid his debt towards the heirs of Lorenzetto, and the two statues were finally placed in the chapel. They were supposedly located on the two sides of the entrance, at least this was their recorded position when Fabio Chigi first visited the chapel in 1626. The statue of Elijah was on the left of the entrance then. Between 1652 and 1656 Gian Lorenzo Bernini restored the chapel, and created two new statues (Habakkuk and the Angel, Daniel and the Lion) to fill the remaining empty niches. At the time the statue of Elijah was moved to its present place on the right of the entrance.
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