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The artist was already in his mid-sixties when he embarked on ten scenes from the Life of St Catherine, commissioned by the Hospital immediately after the Sienese Pope Pius II had secured her controversial canonization in 1461. Giovanni would have known her story intimately: working at San Domenico as a young man, he must have met many of her surviving friends and followers. Catherine had prayed to Christ to give her a new, pure heart; a few days later, 'elevated in rapture... her heart leapt out of her body, entered Christ's side, and was made one with his heart'. Here, Catherine levitates outside her greenish grey convent with its pink roofs; the operation is under way, as she holds her left hand to her bosom, and stretches forth her right, her scarlet heart spurting blood. Christ rears up behind his own image as the Man of Sorrows above the open church door.
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