Filippo Ceppaluni, The encounter between saints Peter of Alcantara and Paschal Baylón, oil on canvas, 1718. Church of Santa Maria degli Angeli, Avigliano. (Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons. Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0).

Signed and dated “FILIPPO CEPPALUNI FECIT 1718”, the altarpiece was commissioned for the church of Santa Maria degli Angeli in Avigliano alongside two smaller pictures representing the Madonna del Carmine and  Saint John of Capistrano. On the left is Saint Peter of Alcantara with his face tilted up toward a cross held up by putti. On the right is Saint Paschal Baylón, whose figure is characterised by an ecstatic gaze directed at the monstrance from which a divine light emanates. The picture highlights Ceppaluni’s re-elaboration of stylistic models typical of Luca Giordano as exemplified by a comparison with the Encounter between Charles Borromeo and Filippo Neri  painted in 1704 for the Neapolitan church of the Girolamini. In the bottom right corner in between two rivers is a large church with a nave and two aisles with a gabled façade and sloping roof, behind which a dome and bell tower stand. To the left, on the pathway to the church, are two wayfarers advancing toward the city pushing a mule. The temple depicted does not seem to be comparable to any sacred building present in the Luciania region, which makes the identification of the place problematic at the moment.