Guercino

{{Short description|17th-century painter of the Italian Seicento}}

{{Infobox artist

| name = Guercino

| image = Self-portrait by Guercino.jpg

| image_size =

| alt =

| caption = Self portrait, {{c.|1635}}

| birth_name = Giovanni Francesco Barbieri

| birth_date = {{birth date |1591|02|08}}

| birth_place = Cento, Duchy of Ferrara

| death_date = {{death date and age |1666|12|22|1591|02|08}}

| death_place = Bologna, Papal States

| nationality = Italian

| known_for = Painting, drawing

| training =

| movement = Baroque

| notable_works =

| patrons =

| awards =

}}

Giovanni Francesco Barbieri (February 8, 1591 – December 22, 1666),Miller, 1964 better known as (il) Guercino{{cite web|url=http://besidetheeasel.blogspot.se/2013/02/guercino-il-magnifico.html|title=Beside the easel |publisher=besidetheeasel.blogspot.se|access-date=14 September 2017}} ({{IPA|it|ɡwerˈtʃiːno|-|It-Guercino.wav}}), was an Italian Baroque painter and draftsman from Cento in the Emilia region, who was active in Rome and Bologna. The vigorous naturalism of his early manner contrasts with the classical equilibrium of his later works. His many drawings are noted for their luminosity and lively style.

Biography

File:Et-in-Arcadia-ego.jpg (c. 1618–1622) marks the first known usage of this Latin motto (inscribed on the plinth beneath the skull). ]]

File:Francesco_Barbieri.jpg{{cite web |title=Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, called Guercino – Ottavio Leoni |url=http://www.ngv.vic.gov.au/explore/collection/work/22613/ |website=www.ngv.vic.gov.au |publisher=National Gallery of Victoria |access-date=12 February 2019 |language=en-AU}} highlights the lifelong squint (a form of strabismus) which prompted the name 'Guercino'.]]

File:Guercino (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri) - Christ and the Woman of Samaria - Google Art Project.jpg's influence is apparent in this canvas Christ and the Woman of Samaria (c. 1619–1620).]]

File:Guercino - The Persian Sibyl - Google Art Project.jpg

Giovanni Francesco Barbieri was born into a family of peasant farmers in Cento, a town in the Po Valley mid-way between Bologna and Ferrara.Mahon, 1937a Being cross-eyed, at an early age he acquired the nickname by which he is universally known, Guercino (a diminutive of the Italian noun {{lang|it|guercio}}, meaning 'squinter').Turner, 2003 Mainly self-taught, at the age of 16, he worked as apprentice in the shop of Benedetto Gennari, a painter of the Bolognese School.Griswold 1991, p. 6 An early commission was for the decoration with frescoes (1615–1616{{cite web |title=Casa Pannini di Cento |url=https://www.geoplan.it/luoghi-interesse-italia/monumenti-provincia-ferrara/cartina-monumenti-cento/monumenti-cento-casa-pannini.htm |website=www.geoplan.it |access-date=8 February 2019 |language=it}}) of Casa Pannini in Cento, where the naturalism of his landscapes already reveals considerable artistic independence, as do his landscapes on canvas Moonlit Landscape and Country Concert from the same era.Stone, pp. 3, 37. In Bologna, he won the praise of Ludovico Carracci. He always acknowledged that his early style had been influenced by study of a Madonna painted by Ludovico Carracci for the Capuchin church in Cento, affectionately known as "La Carraccina".{{cite web |title=La Carraccina |url=http://bbcc.ibc.regione.emilia-romagna.it/pater/loadcard.do?id_card=164519 |website=bbcc.ibc.regione.emilia-romagna.it |publisher=Regione Emilia Romagna |access-date=9 February 2019 |language=it}}

St William Receiving the Monastic Habit (1620, Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna, Italy),{{cite web |title=San Guglielmo d'Aquitania riceve l'abito religioso da San Felice Vescovo. (Vestizione di San Guglielmo) |url=http://www.pinacotecabologna.beniculturali.it/it/content_page/40-sala-26-il-classicismo/52-san-guglielmo-d-aquitania-riceve-l-abito-religioso-da-san-felice-vescovo-br-vestizione-di-san-guglielmo.html |website=www.pinacotecabologna.beniculturali.it |access-date=13 February 2019 |language=it-it |archive-date=9 August 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180809150109/http://www.pinacotecabologna.beniculturali.it/it/content_page/40-sala-26-il-classicismo/52-san-guglielmo-d-aquitania-riceve-l-abito-religioso-da-san-felice-vescovo-br-vestizione-di-san-guglielmo.html |url-status=dead }} painted for Santi Gregorio e Siro in Bologna, was Guercino's largest ecclesiastical commission at the time and is considered a high point of his early career.

His painting Et in Arcadia ego from around 1618–1622 contains the first known usage anywhere of the Latin motto, later taken up by Poussin and others, signifying that death lurks even in the most idyllic setting.{{cite news |last1=Lubbock |first1=Tom |title=Guercino: Et in Arcadia Ego (1618–22) |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/great-works/guercino-et-in-arcadia-ego-1618-22-744410.html |access-date=7 February 2019 |work=The Independent |date=23 February 2007 |language=en}} The dramatic composition of this canvas (related to his Flaying of Marsyas by Apollo (1617–1618{{cite web |title=Palazzo Pitti: Galleria Palatina – Apollo e Marsia |url=http://www.abcfirenze.com/GalleriaFotografica.asp?tipo=U&RicM=309&Foto=GalleriaPalatina-D35.jpg |website=www.abcfirenze.com |language=it |access-date=2019-02-09 |archive-date=2023-03-29 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230329110135/http://www.abcfirenze.com/GalleriaFotografica.asp?tipo=U&RicM=309&Foto=GalleriaPalatina-D35.jpg |url-status=dead }}) created for Cosimo II de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, which shares the same pair of shepherds{{cite web |title=Et in Arcadia Ego by Guercino |url=https://www.wga.hu/html_m/g/guercino/0/arcadia.html |website=www.wga.hu |publisher=Web Gallery of Art |access-date=8 February 2019}}) is typical of Guercino's early works, which are often tumultuous in conception.Griswold 1991, p. 13 He painted two large canvases, Samson Seized by Philistines (1619) and Elijah Fed by Ravens (1620), for Cardinal Giacomo Serra, a Papal Legate to Ferrara.{{cite web |title=Samson Captured by the Philistines |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/436603 |website=www.metmuseum.org |publisher=Metropolitan Museum of Art |access-date=8 February 2019}}Vivian, 1971 Painted at a time when it is unlikely that Guercino could have seen Caravaggio's work in Rome, these works nevertheless display a starkly naturalistic Caravaggesque style.

Rome

File:Guercino - The Woman taken in Adultery - Google Art Project.jpg (1621)]]

File:Guercino Flagellazione.jpg (1657)]]

Guercino was recommended by Marchese Enzo Bentivoglio to the newly elected Bolognese Ludovisi Pope, Pope Gregory XV in 1621.Lawrence Gowing, ed., Biographical Encyclopedia of Artists, v.2 (Facts on File, 2005): 291. The years he spent in Rome, 1621–23, were very productive. From this period are his frescoes Aurora at the casino of the Villa Ludovisi, the ceiling in San Crisogono (1622) of San Chrysogonus in Glory, the portrait of Pope Gregory XV (now in the Getty Museum), and the St. Petronilla Altarpiece for St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican (now in the Capitoline Museums).

Return to Bologna

Following the death of Gregory XV in 1623, Guercino returned to his hometown of Cento. In 1626, he began his frescoes in Piacenza Cathedral. The details of his career after 1629 are well documented in the account book, the Libro dei Conti di Casa Barbieri, that Guercino and his brother Paolo Antonio Barbieri, a notable painter of still lifes, kept updated, and which has been preserved.Griswold 1991, p. 35 Between 1618 and 1631, Giovanni Battista Pasqualini produced 67 engravings that document the early production of Guercino, which is not included in the Libro dei Conti.{{cite web |last1=Gozzi |first1=Fausto |title=Sacro e Profano nelle Incisioni da Guercino |url=http://docplayer.it/19262888-Sacro-e-profano-nelle-incisioni-da-guercino-cento-1590-1666.html |publisher=Culturalia |access-date=12 February 2019 |language=it |date=2006}} In 1642, following the death of his commercial rival Guido Reni, Guercino moved his busy workshop to Bologna, where he was now able to take over Reni's role as the city's leading painter of sacred subjects. In 1655, the Franciscan Order of Reggio{{Clarify|date=March 2025|reason=Presumably Reggio Emillia?}} paid him 300 ducats for the altarpiece of Saint Luke Displaying a Painting of the Madonna and Child (now in Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City).{{cite web | title =Guercino's Saint Luke Displaying a Painting of the Virgin | publisher =Smarthistory at Khan Academy | url =http://smarthistory.khanacademy.org/guercino.html | access-date =March 15, 2013 | archive-date =November 2, 2014 | archive-url =https://web.archive.org/web/20141102030315/http://smarthistory.khanacademy.org/guercino.html | url-status =dead }} The Corsini family also paid him 300 ducats for the Flagellation of Christ painted in 1657.

File:San salvatore, bo, int., tomba del guercino.JPG]]

Style

Guercino was remarkable for the extreme rapidity of his executions: he completed no fewer than 106 large altarpieces for churches, and his other paintings amount to about 144. He was also a prolific draftsman. His production includes many drawings, usually in ink, washed ink, or red chalk. Most of them were made as preparatory studies for his paintings, but he also drew landscapes, genre subjects, and caricatures for his own enjoyment. Guercino's drawings are known for their fluent style in which "rapid, calligraphic pen strokes combined with dots, dashes, and parallel hatching lines describe the forms".Griswold 1991, p. 36

Despite presumably having monocular vision due to a 'lazy' right eye, Guercino showed remarkable facility to imply depth in his works, perhaps assisted by an enhanced perception of light and shade thanks to compensation by the healthy eye.Scholtz et al, 2019 Other artists with different types of strabismus include Rembrandt, Dürer, Degas, Picasso and (possibly) Leonardo da Vinci.{{cite journal |last1=Tyler |first1=CW |title=Evidence That Leonardo da Vinci Had Strabismus. |journal=JAMA Ophthalmology |volume=137 |issue=1 |pages=82–86 |date=18 October 2018 |doi=10.1001/jamaophthalmol.2018.3833 |pmid=30347053 |url=https://christophertyler.org/CWTyler/Art%20Investigations/ART%20PDFs/Tyler_JAMA-0_180017.pdf |pmc=6439801}}

His lively treatment of the Aurora myth (1621, Villa Aurora, Rome, Italy), painted for the pope's nephew, Cardinal Ludovico Ludovisi.Vodret and Gozzi, 2011, pp. 159–161 challenges the more measured representation of the same subject painted by Guido Reni at Palazzo Rospigliosi on behalf of a Ludovisi family rival Scipione Borghese and makes a statement of political triumph.Unger, 2016, p. 9; {{cite web |title=Aurora by Guercino |url=https://www.wga.hu/html_m/g/guercino/3/05aurora.html |website=www.wga.hu |publisher=Web Gallery of Art |access-date=15 February 2019}} Some of his later works are closer to the style of Reni, and are painted with much greater luminosity and clarity than his early works with their prominent use of chiaroscuro.

Pupils

Guercino continued to paint and teach until the end of his life, amassing a notable fortune. He died on December 22, 1666, in Bologna.{{Cite web |title=Guercino (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri) {{!}} The Vocation of Saint Aloysius (Luigi) Gonzaga |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/436604 |access-date=2023-04-12 |website=The Metropolitan Museum of Art |language=en}} As he never married, his estate passed to his nephews and pupils, Benedetto Gennari II and Cesare Gennari. Other pupils include Giulio Coralli,Orlandi, 1719, p. 207 Giuseppe Bonati of Ferrara,Orlandi, p. 207 Cristoforo Serra of Cesena,Orlandi, p. 120. Father Cesare Pronti of Ferrara,Orlandi, p. 350. Sebastiano Ghezzi,Orlandi, p. 399 Sebastiano Bombelli,Orlandi, p. 397. Lorenzo Bergonzoni of Bologna,Orlandi, p. 294. Francesco Paglia of Brescia.,Orlandi, p. 171 Benedetto Zallone of Cento, Bartolomeo Caravoglia,Lanzi, 1847, pp. 309–310 Giuseppe Maria Galeppini of Forli, and Matteo Loves.

Works

File:Moonlight Landscape (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri Guercino) - Nationalmuseum - 20163.tif|Moonlit Landscape (c. 1616, oil on canvas, 55 × 71 cm, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, Sweden).{{cite web |title=Giovanni Francesco Barbieri Il Guercino |url=http://emp-web-84.zetcom.ch/eMP/eMuseumPlus?service=ExternalInterface&module=artist&objectId=7953&viewType=detailView |website=emp-web-84.zetcom.ch |publisher=Nationalmuseum |access-date=11 February 2019}} An early, naturalistic landscape.

File:Guercino La mietitura.jpg|Harvesting (1615–1617, fresco, transferred to canvas, 18 × 23.5 cm, Pinacoteca, Cento, Italy). One of the frescoes created (with the assistance of Lorenzo Gennari) for Casa Pannini in Cento.{{cite web |title=Barbieri Giovan Francesco, Mietitura |url=http://catalogo.fondazionezeri.unibo.it/scheda/opera/58933/Barbieri%20Giovan%20Francesco%2C%20Mietitura |website=catalogo.fondazionezeri.unibo.it |publisher=Fondazione Zeri, University of Bologna |access-date=11 February 2019}}

File:Susana y los viejos (Guercino).jpg|Susanna and the Elders (1617, oil on canvas, 176 × 208 cm, Museo del Prado, Madrid, Spain) was painted in Bologna for Cardinal Alessandro Ludovisi, the future Pope Gregory XV.{{cite web |title=Susannah and the Elders - The Collection |url=https://www.museodelprado.es/en/the-collection/art-work/susanna-and-the-elders/9c9b3611-5c80-457d-a99a-e5580f3074e6 |website=Museo Nacional del Prado |access-date=11 February 2019 |language=en}} The dramatic dynamism of this early work contrasts with the studied classicism of the artist's later depiction of the same story in 1649–1650.Posner, 1968

File:Samson Captured by the Philistines MET DT503.jpg|Samson Seized by the Philistines, 1619 This work depicts the biblical scene where Samson is betrayed by his lover Delilah. Samson is at the center, though his face cannot be seen, and surrounding him are the Philistines who have come to blind him after cutting off his hair, his source of strength.

File:Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, gen. Il Guercino - Gleichnis vom verlorenen Sohn - GG 253 - Kunsthistorisches Museum.jpg|Return of the Prodigal Son, 1619

File:Guercino Guglielmo d'Aquitania.jpg|St William Receiving the Monastic Habit, 1620

File:Guercino - Aurora - WGA10920.jpg|Aurora, 1621 (ceiling fresco, tempera), Villa Aurora, Rome, Italy

File:Guercino Catura di Cristo.jpg|Capturing Christ, 1621

File:Guercino - Saint Matthew and the Angel - Google Art Project.jpg|Saint Matthew and the Angel, 1622

File:Guercino - Assumption of Mary - Hermitage.jpg|Assumption, c. 1623, Hermitage Museum

File:Guercino Morte di Didone.jpg|La morte di Didone, 1631

File:Guercino Christ et la samaritaine.jpg|Christ and the Woman of Samaria II, c. 1640–1641

File:Guercino - ST. SEBASTIAN. 1642.jpg|St. Sebastian, 1642, Pushkin Museum

File:Atlas holding up the celestial globe - Guercino (1646).jpg|Atlas holding up the celestial globe, 1646

File:Guercino - St Peter Weeping before the Virgin - WGA10949.jpg|St Peter Weeping before the Virgin, 1647

File:Guercino - Mars with Cupid - Google Art Project.jpg|Mars with Cupid, 1649

File:Guercino - Cleopatra and Octavian - Google Art Project.jpg|Cleopatra and Octavian, 1649

File:Joseph and Potiphar's Wife - Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, called Guercino, 1649 - NG Wash DC.jpg|Joseph and Potiphar's Wife, 1649, National Gallery of Art

File:Guercino - St. Cecilia - Google Art Project.jpg|St. Cecilia, 1649

File:Guercino Susanna and The Elders Parma.jpg|Susanna and the Elders, 1650

File:Guercino (Giovanni Francesco Barbieri) - David with the Head of Goliath - Google Art Project.jpg|David with the Head of Goliath, circa 1650

File:The Vocation of Saint Aloysius Gonzaga.PNG|The Vocation of Saint Aloysius Gonzaga, 1650

File:Guercino Astrologia.jpg|Personification of Astrology, ca. 1650–1655, Blanton Museum of Art, Texas

File:Guercino Return of the prodigal son.jpg|The Return of the Prodigal Son, 1651

File:'King David', painting by Giovanni Francesco Barbieri (il Guercino) c. 1768.jpg|King David, 1651

File:Guercino - Martyrdom of St Catherine - WGA10940.jpg|The Martyrdom of Saint Catherine, 1653, Hermitage Museum

File:Samson and Delilah mg 0034.jpg|Samson and Delilah, 1654

File:Guercino, san girolamo penitente.JPG|Saint Jerome, c.1640–1650

Exhibitions

A groundbreaking exhibition held at the Archiginnasio of Bologna in 1968 provided the most complete panorama of Guercino's work to date, including paintings from the later parts of his career after the death of Pope Gregory XV, which had previously attracted relatively little attention. For the fourth centenary of the artist's birth in 1991, an expanded exhibition was organized by the Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna in conjunction with the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt and the National Gallery of Art, Washington.Mahon, 1992, p. 7 Both these exhibitions were curated by Guercino's biggest modern champion, Denis Mahon, who was responsible for their catalogues.van Serooskerken, 1991 In 2011–2012, a large exhibition was displayed at Palazzo Barberini in Rome, dedicated to the memory of Mahon, who had recently died.Vodret and Gozzi, 2011 An exhibition displayed at the National Museum, Warsaw in 2013–2014 offered another extensive presentation of the artist's work.{{cite web |title=Guercino. Triumf baroku |trans-title=Guercino. Triumph of the Baroque|url=http://www.legitymizm.org/ogloszenie-guercino-triumf-baroku |website=www.legitymizm.org |publisher=Organizacja Monarchistów Polskich |access-date=12 February 2019 |language=pl}}

Citations

References

;Books and articles on Guercino

{{cite journal |last1=Griswold |first1=William M |title=Guercino |journal=Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin |date=1991|volume=48 |issue=4 |pages=5–56 |doi=10.2307/3258858 |jstor=3258858 |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/metpublications/Guercino_The_Metropolitan_Museum_of_Art_Bulletin_v_48_no_4_Spring_1991}}
{{cite book| first=Luigi| last=Lanzi| year=1847| title=History of Painting in Italy; From the Period of the Revival of the Fine Arts to the End of the Eighteenth Century|volume=III| translator = Thomas Roscoe| publisher= Henry G. Bohn|location=London|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=k0sGAAAAQAAJ| author-link=Luigi Lanzi}}
{{cite journal |last1=Mahon |first1=Denis |author-link=Denis Mahon |title=Notes on the Young Guercino I. – Cento and Bologna |journal=The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs |date=1937a |volume=70 |issue=408 |pages=112–122 |jstor=866850}}
{{cite journal |last1=Mahon |first1=Denis |title=Notes on the Young Guercino II. – Cento and Ferrara |journal=The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs |date=1937b |volume=70 |issue=409 |pages=177–189 |jstor=866750}}
{{cite book|last=Mahon|first=Denis |title=Guercino: Master Painter of Baroque|url=https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/002585966|year=1992|publisher=National Gallery of Art|isbn=978-0-89468-167-7}}
{{cite encyclopedia |url=http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/giovanni-francesco-detto-il-guercino-barbieri_(Dizionario-Biografico) |title=Barbieri, Giovanni Francesco detto il Guercino |first=Dwight C. |last=Miller |encyclopedia=Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani |language=it |volume=6 |year=1964}}
{{citation|title=Abecedario pittorico|last1=Orlandi|first1=Pellegrino Antonio|last2=Guarienti|first2=Pietro|year=1719|place=Naples |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=x3MGAAAAQAAJ}}.
{{cite journal |last1=Posner |first1=Donald |title=The Guercino Exhibition at Bologna |journal=The Burlington Magazine |date=1968 |volume=110 |issue=788 |pages=596–607 |jstor=875813}}
{{cite journal |last1=Scholtz |first1=Sibylle |last2=MacMorris |first2=Lee |last3=Krogmann |first3=Frank |last4=Auffarth |first4=Gerd U |title=Lights and darks of a picture. The life of Giovanni Francesco Barbieri, "il Guercino" – the squinter. |journal=Strabismus |date=2019 |pages=39–42 |doi=10.1080/09273972.2019.1559532 |pmid=30626256|url=http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0183-13doc1996 |volume=27|issue=1 |s2cid=58585811 }} {{subscription required}}
{{cite journal |last1=van Serooskerken |first1=Carel van Tuyll |title=Guercino. Bologna, Cento and Frankfurt |journal=The Burlington Magazine |date=1991 |volume=133 |issue=1065 |pages=864–868 |jstor=885077}}
{{cite book|last=Stone|first=David M |title=Guercino: Catalogo Completo Dei Dipinti |year=1991|publisher=Cantini|language=it|isbn=978-88-7737-137-9}}
{{cite encyclopedia |last1=Turner |first1=Nicholas |title=Oxford Art Online |chapter=Guercino |publisher=Oxford Art Online (Grove Art) |language=en |doi=10.1093/gao/9781884446054.article.t035416 |date=2003|isbn=9781884446054 }} {{subscription required}}
{{cite book|last=Unger|first=Daniel M|title=Guercino's Paintings and His Patrons' Politics in Early Modern Italy|date=2016|publisher=Routledge | isbn=978-1-351-56482-3}}
{{cite journal |last1=Vivian |first1=Frances |title=Guercino Seen from the Archivio Barberini |journal=The Burlington Magazine |date=1971 |volume=113 |issue=814 |pages=22–29 |jstor=876502}}
{{cite book |last1=Vodret |first1=Rossella |last2=Gozzi |first2=Fausto |title=Guercino (1591–1666): capolavori da Cento e da Roma |date=2011 |publisher=Giunti |isbn=9788809775350 |language=it}}

External links

{{external media | width = 154px | float = right

| headerimage=154px

| video1 = [http://smarthistory.khanacademy.org/guercino.html Guercino's Saint Luke Displaying a Painting of the Virgin], Smarthistory}}

{{Art UK bio}}
[http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/g/guercino/index.html Paintings by Guercino] on the Web Gallery of Art
[http://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/guercino/ Getty exhibition of Guercino drawings]
[http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9038365/Il-Guercino Encyclopædia Britannica, Il Guercino]
[http://guercino.comune.cento.fe.it/index.php?en/1/home Pinacoteca Civica Il Guercino]
[http://guercino.fondazionecarifano.it/index_en.html Virtual exhibition "Guercino a Fano" in high resolution]
[http://libmma.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/compoundobject/collection/p15324coll10/id/81943 Jusepe de Ribera, 1591–1652], an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Guercino (see index)
[http://libmma.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/compoundobject/collection/p15324coll10/id/63259/rec/2 Velázquez ], an exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art (fully available online as PDF), which contains material on Guercino (see index)