The Ecstasy of Saint Theresa (alternatively Saint Teresa in Ecstasy or Transverberation of Saint Teresa) is the central marble group of a sculpture complex designed and completed by Giovanni Lorenzo Bernini for the Cornaro Chapel of Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome. It is one of the sculptural masterpieces of High Roman Baroque. The entire ensemble was overseen and completed by a mature Bernini during the Pamphili papacy of Innocent X.

During this time, the sculptor's past involvement with the profligate expenses of the prior Barberini papacy had disgraced Bernini and deprived him of much Vatican patronage. The services of Bernini's studio were thus available to a patron such as the Venetian Cardinal Federico Cornaro (1579–1673). Cornaro had chosen the otherwise nondescript church of the Discalced Carmelites for his burial chapel.

He had reason to avoid burial in Venice, since his appointment as a cardinal by Urban VIII while his father Giovanni was Doge had created a furor in his home-city, which banned families from holding such powerful positions simultaneously. The chapel chosen had previously depicted St. Paul in Ecstasy, and the Cardinal replaced it with the ecstatic event undergone by the first Carmelite saint, recently canonized in 1622.

It was completed in 1652 for the then sum of 12,000 scudi. The chapel is an explosion of colored marble, metal, and detail. Light filters though a window above Teresa, underscored by gilded rays.

The dome is frescoed with the illusionistic cherub-filled sky with the descending light of the Holy Ghost allegorized as a dove. On the side walls, in boxes as if at the theatre, are life-size high-relief donor portraits of the male members of the Cornaro family, present and discussing the event.

Similar to 0 things you like: