Sculptuur van Paus Gregorius XIII door Camillo Rusconi de Sint-Pietersbasiliek in Vaticaanstad before 1860

Curator: This gelatin-silver print, found in the Rijksmuseum's collection, reproduces Camillo Rusconi's sculpture of Pope Gregory XIII. The image itself comes from a book, printed sometime before 1860. What do you think? Editor: Marble giving way to silver! It's fascinating seeing sculpture mediated like this. The shadows almost feel liquid, draining some of the papal pomp—dare I say, democratizing it? Curator: Rusconi's sculpture is definitely theatrical. He made it for St. Peter’s Basilica, and that context—high Baroque Rome—is everything. Think of the labor involved: quarrying, transporting, carving such a massive piece of marble... Editor: Precisely! I'm also drawn to the text visible alongside the image—fragments of a novel or travelogue. Look, mentions of Hilda, St Peter’s. Someone turning sculpture into… domesticity. How about that shift of context! Curator: It's a perfect echo of the artistic transformation at play! Turning monumental religious work to mere sentimental interior. The book itself, the binding and paper, would've been relatively accessible. Compare that to the closed world of high art patronage where Rusconi operated. Editor: I do agree. What I find also striking is that capturing a statue of a pope and displaying it within the intimate space of a book—makes it more secular, open to different interpretations, especially with the facing fictional page in English adding literary layers. Curator: Absolutely, and Rusconi's Baroque style—the dynamism, the flowing robes—it all becomes a bit flattened, a bit quaint. But in that transformation something new emerges. It has an impact on us still. Editor: And isn't it wonderful? This chance encounter with labor, material, high ideals all flattened in turn to rise to the unexpected, to question, and ultimately re-contextualize.