Posts in Category: Italian
Antonio da Correggio
Antonio Allegri da Correggio, August 1489 – March 5, 1534, was an Italian Renaissance painter active primarily in Parma and the surrounding region of Emilia. Born in Correggio, near Reggio Emilia, he was the son of Pellegrino Allegri. Little documentation survives regarding his early training, but he was probably influenced by the Mantegna tradition through local artists and by the work of Andrea Mantegna. He was later exposed to the art of Leonardo da Vinci and Venetian painting, influences that shaped his mature style.
Correggio is known for religious altarpieces, mythological subjects, portraits, and monumental fresco decorations. His major commissions include the Camera di San Paolo, the church of San Giovanni Evangelista, and the cathedral of Parma, where he developed innovative illusionistic ceiling paintings that became influential throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. His paintings combine soft modeling, dynamic movement, and complex spatial effects, helping to bridge the High Renaissance and the Baroque.
Although he did not establish a large workshop, his work strongly influenced later artists, particularly Parmese painters such as Parmigianino and later Baroque masters. Important collections of his work are held by the Louvre Museum, the Kunsthistorisches Museum, the Gemäldegalerie, the Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, the Hermitage Museum, and the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, while his fresco cycles remain in Parma.
Giuseppe Maria Crespi
Giuseppe Maria Crespi, March 14, 1665–July 16, 1747, was an Italian painter born and active chiefly in Bologna. He first studied with Angelo Michele Toni, then with Domenico Maria Canuti, Carlo Cignani, and Giovanni Antonio Burrini. He also studied works by Correggio, Barocci, and Venetian painters during travels in northern Italy.
Crespi became known as lo Spagnolo and developed an independent style informed by Bolognese traditions and a broad range of Italian and northern European painting. He established a school in Bologna whose pupils included more than thirty artists; among those associated with his circle were Pietro Longhi and Giovanni Battista Piazzetta. His sons Luigi, Ferdinando, and Antonio Liborio also trained under him.
His works are held in major collections including the Uffizi Galleries, the Louvre, the Art Institute of Chicago, the National Gallery in London, the National Gallery of Art in Washington, the State Hermitage Museum, and the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza.
Bartolomeo Manfredi
Bartolomeo Manfredi, August 25, 1582 – December 12, 1622, was an Italian Baroque painter and one of the earliest and most influential followers of Caravaggio. Working primarily in Rome, he helped establish the dramatic style known as Caravaggism through his powerful use of light, naturalistic figures, and closely observed scenes from everyday life and the Bible.
Although little is known about his early training, Manfredi developed a distinctive interpretation of Caravaggio’s innovations. His paintings of musicians, gamblers, soldiers, saints, and biblical narratives were widely admired and became models for many artists from Italy and northern Europe. His influence was especially important in shaping the work of later Caravaggisti.
Manfredi died in Rome at the age of forty. Though his career was relatively brief, his paintings remain among the finest examples of early seventeenth-century Italian Baroque art and are preserved in major museum collections throughout Europe, Japan, and the United States.
Caravaggio
Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, September 29, 1571 – July 18, 1610, was an Italian painter.
He worked primarily in Rome before spending his final years in Naples, Malta and Sicily.
Caravaggio was known for closely observed figures, stark contrasts of light and dark, and religious scenes presented with contemporary models and settings.
Carlo Crivelli
Carlo Crivelli, c 1430–c 1495, was an Italian painter born in Venice who worked chiefly in the Marche. He came from a family of painters: his father, Jacopo, and his younger brother, Vittore, were painters. He probably received his first training in his father’s workshop and may have trained with Francesco Squarcione in Padua.
Crivelli was documented as a painter in Venice in 1457. After periods in Venice and Zara, he worked in the Marche, including Ascoli Piceno, Camerino, Fabriano, and Matelica. His early formation was shaped by Venetian painters including the Vivarini and by the Paduan circle of Squarcione; Giorgio Schiavone and Andrea Mantegna were important artistic influences.
He was a successful maker of altarpieces and painted for churches and religious institutions in the Marche. Principal collections of his work include the National Gallery, London; the Vatican Museums; the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the Museo Poldi Pezzoli; the Rijksmuseum; and the National Gallery of Art.
Giovanni Battista Piazzetta
Giovanni Battista Piazzetta, February 13, 1682 or 1683–April 28, 1754, was an Italian painter and draughtsman born in Venice. He trained in the workshop of his father, a woodcarver and sculptor, before studying painting with Antonio Molinari. He continued his studies with Giuseppe Maria Crespi in Bologna.
Piazzetta worked chiefly in Venice and became a member of Bologna’s Accademia Clementina in 1727. In 1750 he was appointed director of the Venetian academy. His pupils included Giuseppe Angeli and Domenico Maggiotto. He collaborated with the engraver Marco Pitteri and the publisher Giovanni Battista Albrizzi.
His paintings and drawings are held by the Gallerie dell’Accademia in Venice, the Louvre Museum, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Detroit Institute of Arts, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Ashmolean Museum, and the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza.
Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo
Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo, August 30, 1727 – March 3, 1804, was an Italian painter, printmaker, and draftsman.
He was the son and pupil of Giovanni Battista Tiepolo and worked with him in Venice, Würzburg, and Madrid. His independent work includes religious paintings, frescoes, genre scenes, and drawings.
His late work is especially associated with Punchinello subjects and the frescoes from the Villa Zianigo, now at Ca’ Rezzonico in Venice.
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, March 5, 1696–March 27, 1770, was an Italian painter and printmaker born in Venice. He trained with Gregorio Lazzarini, joined the Venetian painters’ guild in 1717, and studied the work of earlier Venetian painters, particularly Paolo Veronese.
He painted altarpieces, mythological and historical scenes, oil sketches, and large decorative fresco cycles in Venice and northern Italy. From 1750 to 1753 he worked at the Würzburg Residence with his sons Giovanni Domenico and Lorenzo, both painters. His frescoes at Villa Valmarana ai Nani in Vicenza date to 1757.
Tiepolo moved to Spain in 1762 to work for King Charles III, painting ceilings in the Royal Palace in Madrid. He died in Madrid in 1770. His works are held by the Museo Nacional del Prado, the National Gallery, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and numerous other collections.
