Batoni represented Jesus with long hair and a short beard, holding in his left hand an inflamed heart with a crown of thorns and with a cross at the top.

Batoni's artwork became popular for the official image for the devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

Batoni was born 18 years after St. Margaret Mary Alacoque died, the saint who inspires all Sacred Heart of Jesus portraits.

The apparition was said to have occurred when St Margaret prayed to Jesus before the Blessed Sacrament during the feast of St. John the Evangelist in 1673.

"[1] The portrait is an altarpiece placed above the altar in the northern side chapel of the Church of the Gesù in Rome.