St. Catherine of Siena Exorcising a Possessed Woman

Girolamo di Benvenuto's St. Catherine of Siena Exorcising a Possessed Woman, painted around 1500 and now in the Denver Art Museum, depicts one of the miraculous episodes from the life of Catherine of Siena, the Dominican mystic and Doctor of the Church who was renowned not only for her visions and political activity but also for her power over demonic possession. Catherine of Siena, who died in 1380 and was canonized in 1461, was among the most beloved female saints of the Italian Renaissance, and her life provided narrative painters with dramatic episode and visible miracle. Girolamo di Benvenuto, a Sienese painter trained in the tradition of Matteo di Giovanni and working alongside contemporaries like Pinturicchio, brings Sienese narrative energy to this unusual subject.

The narrative composition contrasts the composed, commanding figure of Catherine with the writhing, disturbed figure of the possessed woman. Girolamo di Benvenuto deploys Sienese warm color and careful figure arrangement to make the dramatic confrontation legible. The palette favors clear, saturated tones.