TITO, Santi di
(b. 1536, Sansepolcro, d. 1602, Firenze)

Vision of St Thomas Aquinas

1593
Oil on panel, 362 x 233 cm
San Marco, Florence

This altarpiece was commissioned by Sebastiano Pandolfini del Turco for the del Turco Chapel in the church of San Marco.

The painting depicts a miraculous event in the life of the Dominican saint when Christ spoke to him from a painted crucifix. It shows Thomas kneeling in a religious rapture before a crucified Christ, flanked by St Catherine of Alexandria and the Virgin Mary, Mary Magdalene, and St John, who seem to have moved out of the painting depicted on the walls of the niche behind them into physical space. Here St Thomas's devotion is so intense that the icon has disappeared to be replaced by the real event.