Blessed Ascending to Heaven n.d.

Curator: Giovanni Francesco Romanelli created this drawing, called *Blessed Ascending to Heaven.* Editor: Wow, it feels so light, so airy! Like the whole scene is just exhaling into the heavens. You’ve got this crowd, these figures huddled together, but they don't seem weighed down. There's a real sense of ascension about the drawing. Curator: The interesting thing about a piece like this is trying to determine its role within a larger system of patronage. Romanelli was working in Rome in the 17th century, deeply embedded in the world of papal commissions. Drawings like this were often preparatory studies, proposals even, for larger painted works that would adorn churches and palaces. Editor: It's like catching a fleeting thought, isn't it? Pen and ink and chalk on paper… he’s captured movement so well, like a swirl of bodies and anticipation. Do you think the softness, that sort of sepia wash, helps add to the feeling of transcendence? Curator: Absolutely, that restrained palette serves the scene. By limiting the colour, all the attention can focus on the emotionality and the story of ascension, in this case perhaps something more complex and contested. The Church invested heavily in visual messaging during this era; images could serve to sway opinion, inspire piety and reassert power amid social and religious turmoil. Editor: So, an instrument of power as well as spiritual expression? Because to me, the raw beauty of the drawing – those figures reaching up, the angel guiding them… there's a tangible sense of hope in that upward movement. Like escaping something, leaving the earthly behind. Curator: And remember, what *we* see now as a beautiful drawing might then have been viewed as a step towards something greater, grander and more politically significant within a system of patronage. Though it speaks to both worlds. Editor: I love how that tension gives it life now, this quiet, reverent scene that's maybe humming with bigger ideas. Like a whispered secret, somehow. It makes you think about your own… ascent, whatever that might mean. Curator: Indeed, a simple drawing then becomes a window into understanding the intricacies of its historical moment and the long-lasting influence it has had on our ways of seeing art and understanding the artist’s ideas.