Luca Giordano - Saint Michael the Archangel driving out the rebel angels ca. 1665-1680 - Oil on canvas 193 x 146 cm The canvas depicts the archangel Michael in golden armour, caught in the act of defeating and driving the rebel angels back into the abyss. The figure of the saint, in a dominant and dynamic position, brandishes his sword and points upwards, while below him the naked and convulsing bodies of the fallen demons, rendered with vigorous chiaroscuro and Baroque accents of strong theatricality, swirl around. The compositional structure, built on energetic diagonals and luminous contrasts, refers directly to the language of Luca Giordano and his workshop, who tackled this subject several times, as attested by the famous large canvas of St. Michael defeating the rebel angels in the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna and a similar version in the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin, as well as other replicas and variants in public and private collections. The present work, in terms of its size and quality, is therefore part of the broad iconographic fortune of the theme, disseminated by the Jordan workshop through solutions of strong devotional and scenographic impact.