Detail of the vault of the Chapel of St Sebastian in St Peter’s, Rome, cartoon

Another detail from the Chapel of St. Sebastian vault cartoon from around 1633 by Pietro da Cortona documents his preparatory process for the St. Peter's commission. These large-scale cartoons were essential working drawings for transferring compositions to fresco. Cortona was the supreme master of Roman High Baroque decoration, whose ceiling fresco for the Gran Salone of the Barberini Palace (1633–39) defined the illusionistic ceiling painting that dominated European decorative art for a cen...

The cartoon reveals Cortona's confident draftsmanship and his ability to conceive dramatic figural compositions at monumental scale.