the Extasy of St. Francis

The Ecstasy of St. Francis from around 1440 depicts the mystical experience of Francis of Assisi, a subject deeply meaningful in Sienese spirituality. Giovanni di Paolo's interpretation emphasizes the visionary quality of the saint's experience through his characteristic use of otherworldly landscape and expressive figural distortion. Characteristic of the artist's mature approach, the work displays brilliant, jewel-like color, gold grounds, lyrical figure types of Gothic grace, perspectival experiments that create strange compressed spaces, intense narrative invention.

The ecstatic saint is rendered with the elongated proportions and intense expression typical of Giovanni di Paolo, set against a landscape that transcends naturalistic representation to suggest spiritual vision.