Father Pepe Preaching to Sailors c. 1740

Pier Leone Ghezzi rendered "Father Pepe Preaching to Sailors" with ink on laid paper. The oratory priest gesticulates wildly before a small crowd, his right hand raised to his head, as if extracting wisdom, while the other floats outwards in a display. This is a posture that stretches back through antiquity, to the orators of ancient Rome. A figure working up his audience, swaying their opinions with persuasive movement and gesture. Yet, the sleeping figure at the preacher's feet undercuts the performance. One can’t help but compare this figure to the great philosophers that came before him, such as Plato, teaching his students, of which some would be in disagreement and even fall asleep during his talks. The motif of the preacher is ever-present, yet here it appears infused with a sardonic humor. The preacher is a recurring character, a symbol of the complicated relationship between authority, belief, and, in this case, the rather more prosaic realities of human attention. It is a fascinating display of how archetypes are ever re-emerging, twisting, and revealing new layers of meaning.