Judith with the Head of Holofernes

Stanzione's Judith with the Head of Holofernes, painted around 1630, depicts the celebrated Old Testament heroine who saved Israel by seducing and beheading the Assyrian general Holofernes. The subject was perennially popular in Baroque painting — combining female heroism, sexual allure, violence, and deliverance — and had been treated memorably by Caravaggio, Artemisia Gentileschi, and numerous others. Stanzione's Naples was deeply marked by Caravaggio's two visits and the subsequent Caravaggist school, but Stanzione brings a more refined, classicizing elegance to the subject than the raw drama of Caravaggio's treatment. The Metropolitan Museum of Art's version is among the finest of his several treatments of this subject.

Stanzione renders Judith as a figure of calm dignity rather than violent exultation, distinguishing his interpretation from more dramatic contemporaries. The palette is rich but refined — deep reds and golds against a dark ground — with Judith's face and hands receiving the most luminous treatment. The severed head of Holofernes is rendered with controlled realism that avoids gratuitous horror.