Salome Asking Herod for the Head of Saint John the Baptist

Giovanni di Paolo · 1455–60

Medium

Tempera on panel

Original size

69.1 × 36 cm (27 3/16 × 14 3/16 in.); Framed: 80.1 × 47.7 × 8.3 cm (31 1/2 × 18 3/4 × 3 1/4 in.)

Currently held

Art Institute of Chicago

Movement

Italian Renaissance

Few medieval paintings capture moral horror with such delicate, almost otherworldly stillness as this small tempera panel by Giovanni di Paolo. Working in Siena during the mid-fifteenth century, di Paolo occupied a fascinating position between two artistic worlds — he was deeply rooted in the expressive, gold-inflected tradition of late Gothic Sienese painting while brushing up against the new Renaissance ideas filtering in from Florence. His figures are characteristically elongated, his colours jewel-bright, and his compositions arranged with a flattened, almost dreamlike logic that feels less concerned with physical space than with emotional intensity. In this panel, Salome's courtly composure in the act of requesting the Baptist's head sits in deliberate, unsettling contrast to the crowded, ornate setting around her. The painting is one of a series of panels di Paolo created depicting scenes from the life of John the Baptist, several of which are now held by the Art Institute of Chicago — testament to how thoroughly his narrative cycle has been dispersed across collections over the centuries. The hand-painted oil reproduction translates di Paolo's luminous palette and intricate detail into a medium with greater depth and physicality, bringing this compelling, centuries-old image into a form made to last in a domestic space.