Our tondo displays a specific painting technique – fresco applied to lime, itself fixed to a wicker frame – which demonstrates that it was conceived from the outset by the artist as a movable artwork, like the other three tondi in this series. His brushwork was renowned for its speed, and our picture was executed in two days (fresco, as its name suggests, is painted on fresh plaster, and each section of the work must be completed before it dries, thus not exceeding a single day).

The subject of the encounter between Christ and the Samaritan woman is recounted only in Saint John’s Gospel (IV.1-30). While resting near a well, Christ asked a woman who had come there to draw water to let him drink, to her great astonishment, as he was not supposed to address Samaritans because of the antagonism between the Jews and the people of Samaria.

The dynamic poses of the two figures, their interaction, the contrasting tones of their drapery, and the overall freshness of painting, typical of frescoes, lend perfect rhythm to the foreground. One can discern touches of pigment applied “a secco” (wet on dry), emphasizing a line of drapery or a burst of light. The background opens onto a bright, rural landscape, with alternating a lakeside scene, trees, and a sky crossed by beautiful white and blue clouds.

A brilliant artist, known to posterity as “Luca fa presto”, Giordano was prolific and versatile, evolving as he studied what he saw during sojourns in Rome, Florence and Venice, before returning relatively late to his native Naples. In 1692, he left for Spain, summoned by King Charles II, and spent an extremely successful time there, painting grand frescoed decoration in the Escorial, the Casa del Buen Retiro in Madrid, and the Cathedral in Toledo – an intense and colossal output that continued for a decade. On the death of Charles II in 1702 Giordano returned to Italy, where he remained unceasingly active in Naples to the end of his life.