TESTA, Pietro

etching

8 x 11 3/4 in

After leaving home with money from his father and then squandering it, the Prodigal Son is not only starving but is reduced to tending foul pigs for a farmer. Pietro Testa chose to depict the son at the moment he realizes how foolishly he has behaved and decides to return home. As recounted in the Bible, he declares that he will beg forgiveness from God and implore his father to make me as one of thy hired servants(because I am) no more worthy to be called thy son. The father, however, welcomes his son back rejoicing, my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. (Book of Luke, 15, 19 and 24)

ca. 1645

TESTA, Pietro

Italian, c. 1612 - 1650

Ala Story Print Collection

1967.49