Marcello Sozzi Or Overbeck : "the Sermon Of Saint Anthony To The Fish"

Marcello Sozzi (Roman School, 19th century) or Overbeck : "Saint Anthony's Preaching to the Fish," oil on canvas, 40 x 28 cm, mounted in its beautiful gilt frame, 55 x 42 cm.
A superb restoration by the Martine Brethes Workshop has freed it from its old overpainting and revealed all the finesse of the scene.
The subject is well-known: Saint Anthony arrives in Rimini, where the churches have been deserted, to bring the heretics back to Christianity. Their leader orders a "wall of silence" to be erected around him, and no one listens when he tries to preach. Arriving at the sea, he declares aloud that since they are unworthy of the word of God, he will address the fish. Thousands of them arrive, naturally arranging themselves from large to small, and listen to him deliver the divine word to them under the astonished gaze of the spectators.
There is a large canvas of the same subject in the left side chapel of the Church of Saint Anthony in Rome, as well as a processional banner, both painted in 1856, but both are less complete, lacking the figure on the left and his rock, and, it seems to me from the photographs, of lesser quality than our canvas, which might be a very detailed modello.
Another theory, suggested by an annotation on the back of the frame and a trace of a monogram in the lower right corner, is that this painting is by Overbeck, the famous Nazarene painter who is said to have provided this model to Sozzi towards the end of his career…
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