The painting, accompanied by an entry by Prof. Fabrizio Magani, depicts the episode of Berenice, the Queen of Egypt who sacrifices her hair as a vow of love and fidelity. The scene is rendered with solemn elegance: the young woman presents her cut hair to a priest, described with luminous softness and refined chromatic harmony. The sumptuous draperies and warm golden tones highlight Padovanino’s ability to merge Titianesque suggestions with a fully seventeenth-century language, vibrant and theatrical. The work exemplifies the artist’s distinctive style, as an original interpreter of the great Venetian tradition, capable of blending classicist balance and narrative pathos, securing his place among the leading figures of Baroque painting in Venice.
