“Bacco the Hutt” Painting by Stefano Gentile

I bought this painting from Italian artist Stefano Gentile’s Etsy shop (SteGentileNerdArt), where he has a fair number of Star Wars-themed paintings in the style of various artists. Some are better than others, but overall I think they’re quite creative. I think my other favorite is Chewbacca as the Mona Lisa… This particular piece is a satire of a 16th century painting titled “Bacchus” by the artist Caravaggio, which you can see below. (It’s called “Bacco” in Italian — hence the title “Bacco the Hutt.”) It’s quite large, at about two feet wide. I like the little details, like the various creatures on his plate, or the little froggy snack in the bowl.

As a painting, I think it’s very well done. I’ve been wanting a classically painted Jabba for quite some time, and I think the combination of the subject matter with the way it’s painted is enough to make it both funny and visually interesting. I don’t think it’s very successful as a parody, though, for a couple of reasons. First, only some of the elements of the original painting are present in this version (the plate of food, the draped cloth, and maybe the hooka pipe, which was a bottle of wine in the original). Second, I don’t think the original painting is well known enough (at least in the US) for people to make the connection (unlike, say, the Mona Lisa).

It’s fairly clear that the artist used this photo of the Sideshow Jabba figure as the inspiration for his pose, but unlike cases where people have lazily used the actual photo to make a collectible, it’s just an inspiration and not a direct copy, so I’m okay with it. In fact, something about the facial expression here gives Jabba a contemplative, almost noble look that I really like. I plan to get an ornate gold frame for this. 🙂

UPDATE: Here it is framed. I thought the frame I picked out was a lighter gold color, but it turned out more of a bronze color. Still, it looks pretty good.