Boticelli: Saint Sebastian

St. Sebastian was a common subject between the Late Gothic and Renaissance periods. Botticelli’s Sebastian stands serene in spite of his torture. Botticelli depicts thick arrows and sends them deep into the saint’s body, unlike many other artists who chose feebler missiles.

No portrayal of the saint is perfectly accurate, however: according to the Legenda Aurea, St. Sebastian was shot until he was as full of arrows as an urchin. Miraculously, he survived his attempt at his life and was nursed back to health, only to be executed when he harangued the emperor Diocletian as the latter passed by.

St. Sebastian’s position hereSt. Sebastian’s position here is called contraposto: he stands with most of his weight on one foot so that his shoulders and arms twist off-axis from the hips and legs. Ancient sculpture shows front-on figures (as in ancient Egyptian Pharaohs), and the Greeks were the first to use contraposto as they began to use the entire body to express emotion.