Annibale Carracci
(1560 - 1609) |
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Genre, Landscape subjects, Altarpieces Art Work
| Name: |
Annibale Carracci |
| Gender: |
Male |
| Place of Birth: |
Bologna |
| Nationality: |
Italian |
| Birth: |
1560 |
| Death: |
1609 |
| Website: |
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| Past Auctions: |
Click Here |
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Quick Facts
| Known For: |
Genre, Landscape subjects, Altarpieces |
| Medium: |
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| Method: |
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| Style: |
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| Fine Art Profession(s): |
Painter
Engraver
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Biography
| Co-founder with his cousin Ludovijo and his brother Agostino of the famed Carracci Academy in Bologna (see introduction under Agostino), Annibale was more prolific than his brother and generally more forward-looking than his cousin. Annibale's early experiments with genre and landscape were notably precocious. His assimilation of Titian, Raphael, Michelangelo, Correggio, and Barocci produced the most advanced and illusionistic images of the time. A pupil of Ludovico, Annibale may also have studied with Passerotti. Annibale's career cannot be discussed entirely apart form Agostino's or Ludovico's owing to their mutual interests and their extensive collaboration. It would be fair to say that Annibale was the primary force behind the production of their mural cycles, while Agostino was more active in the production of etchings and engravings, and Ludovico (who never worked in Rome, and who lived longer than his cousins) maintained the academy in Bologna and promoted its style in Northern Italy. From the start Annibale searched out new directions to breathe life into his work. His tarly experiments with genre subjects begun in the 1580s resulted in some of the most memorable and celebrated Italian examples of low-life subjects. Famous among them are his depictions of a Butcher's Shop (dated 1582-83, Oxford, Christ Church) wherein butchers unselfconsciously pursue their trade before our eyes; the Bean Eater (dated 1583-84, Rome, Galleria Colonna), showing a rudely dressed man eyeing us warily as he consumes his frugal meal; and the Boy Drinking from a Glass, known in several versions, of which the Oxford Christ Church version is considered the most important. Precocious in their daring frankness, and their painterly technique and beautifully composed in a fashion that anticipates later Northern developments (notably that of Ter Brugghen and Honthorst), Annibale's genre paintings are more specific (coming close to portrait studies) than those painted by the Bassani in the north and far earthier and even more crudely rustic than those produced shortly thereafter by Caravaggio in Rome. Closely linked to Annibale's genre paintings are his portraits, depicting friends and family almost exclusively. Fresh, direct, uncompromisingly honest, these portraits such as the brusquely informal Self-Portrait with Others (dated ca. 1585, Milan, Pinacoteca Brera) constitute another milestone in the history of art. Despite some recent reattributions of landscape paintings to Agostino (notably the File ChampStre in Marseille), Annibale also is generally credited for contributing to the development of the independent landscape. Recognizing the potential of landscape as an important motif in his paintings, he soon developed images which landscape took precedence over the subject. An early example is his Vision of St. Eustace (dated ca. 1585-86, Naples, Museo e Galleria Nazionale di Capodimonte). Here the subject matter is merely an excuse to depict a wild and craggy landscape. Annibale also experimented with classically conceived yet evocative landscape featuring such relaxing pastimes as hunting and fishing – in appropriately idyllic settings. Notable examples include his pendants of Hunting and Fishing (Paris, Louvre) and his Landscape with Boatman (Washington, DC, National Gallery of Art). After the formation of the Academy in the early 1580s, Annibale, Agostino, and Ludovico collaborated on projects (mostly murals) wherein they refused to identify their individual roles (preferring to call them "by the Carracci"), although their hands have generally been isolated. The Story of Jason and the Story of Aeneas, painted for the Palazzo Fava in Bologna, and completed in 1584, was the most famous early project. Annibale has been credited with the lion's share of the work. In 1588 the three artists were active on a frieze in the Palazzo Magnani, Bologna, illustrating Episodes from the Lives of Romulus and Remus, completed in 1591. In 1592 Cesare d'Este asked the three artists to produce four canvases for the Palazzo dei Diamante in Ferrara (Venus and Cupid, Modena, Galleria Estense, was Annibale's contribution), and in 1593-94 the three worked on six small frescoes for the ceilings and fireplaces in the Palazzo Sampieri in Bologna. During the 1580s Annibale also undertook a significant series of altarpieces, including the Crucifixion (dated 1583, Bologna, Santa Maria della Carita), in which his monumental orientation and his sculptural conception of form is already evident. In his Baptism of Christ (dated 1585, Bologna, San Gregorio) and his Pietd and Saints of the same year (Parma, Galleria Nazionale), Annibale's study of Correggio to create moving evocative images, with figures that project convincingly in and out of space, is clearly evident. His grandiose conception of form matured in three more altarpieces: Assumption (Madrid, Prado); Assumption (dated 1587, Dresden, GemSldegalerie) and Madonna and Saints (dated 1588, Dresden, Gemaldegalerie). By the 1590s Annibale's command of a dynamic composition unified with actions and gestures of individual figures is found in his Assumption of the Virgin (dated 1592, Bologna, Pinacoteca Nazionale) and Madonna with Child and Saints of the same year (Paris, Louvre). His Christ and the Samaritan Woman (dated 1592-93, Milan, Pinacoteca di Brera) demonstrates his careful study of Titian. Bellori states that when Caravaggio saw Annibale's St. Margaret installed in Santa Caterina dei Funari in 1595, he proclaimed "I rejoice that in my lifetime I really see a painter." Annibale's Domine Quo Vadis (dated ca. 1602, London, National Gallery) is perhaps the most celebrated example of his style based on clarity, simplicity, and dramatic action. In the fall of 1594 Annibale was called to Rome by Cardinal Odoardo Farnese and began his initial arrangements regarding the work for the Palazzo Farnese. After briefly returning to Bologna, Annibale settled in Rome by November 1595. While Ludovico remained in Bologna, Agostino joined his brother early in 1597. Thus began the "Roman" phase of Annibale's career, wherein the ideals of the Carracci Academy were transplanted to Rome and in turn where Raphael, Michelangelo, and antique sculpture had a decided impact on Annibale's style. The Farnese commission began with the Camerino, painted between 1595 and 1597, aided by Agostino. The theme of virtue was developed in a series of episodes taken from the lives of Hercules and Ulysses. Dividing the ceiling into areas of architectural elements framing "picture panels" done in fresco (wherein the architecture seems to open up into an illusion is tic world beyond), Annibale crowned the center with an easel picture of Hercules at the Crossroads (Naples, Galleria Nazionale). Already a sophisticated essay on types of pictorial illusion, the Camarino was a prelude to the Galleria. Begun in 1597, the Galleria is a marvelous and complex play on reality. Fictive picture panels were enframed by "sculpted" figures before which sat "real" nudes who hold rondels with paintings in place. The actual ceiling and walls are affirmed and dissolved with so many levels of illusion that the actual subjects, episodes of divine love and other mythological themes, almost have secondary interest Painting rapidly, sometimes taking as little as three days to complete a compartment, Annibale must have known he was not only affirming his allegiance to the great traditions of the past but also producing something grand, new, and unprecedented. Filled with enthusiasm, despite his modest remunerations (ten scudi a month, plus bread and wine), he eagerly studied Raphael, looked at Roman antiquities, and quoted Michelangelo while reveling in his ability to create illusions of pictures, sculptures, architecture, and figures. As the work progressed, differences sprang up between the two brothers. These are preserved in famous accounts. Annibale, the artist/professional, was consumed with his project, was "not overly clean . . . collar all twisted, cloak every which way, beard unkempt . . . always solitary" (Malvasia). Agostino, by contrast, was an intellectual gentleman with far-flung interests who spent much time with scientists and literati of higher social circles. He evidently couldn't breathe the plaster dust created by the project. Departing for Parma, Agostino left his brother in 1599 to complete the Farnese project with other assistants. Francesco Albani Domenichino, Giovanni Lanfranco, Sisto Badalocchio, and Agostino's son Antonio (all fresh from the Carracci Academy) joined the enterprise in 1601-02 to undertake the large murals depicting episodes from the Perseus myth, probably begun in 1602. Many are thought to have been completed by Domenichino in 1608 after Annibale suffered paralysis in 1605. The final phase of the Galleria project involving a frieze of alternate sequences of frescoes and medallions was most likely a shop effort and probably was not completed until about 1608. Yet its conception and design belong to Annibale. Despite assistance, the Farnese commission is central to Annibale's career. The effort occupied him for more than a decade. It joined Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel and Raphael's Stanze as one of the crowning achievements of Western art. Moreover, its combined assimilation of Michelangelo, Raphael, and the antique, its complex illusionism, its seamless fusion of humor and seriousness, as well as its brilliant grasp of the human form made it a virtual textbook for subsequent Roman painters. The project ultimately may have broken Annibale's spirit. Poorly paid by the Cardinal, Annibale succumbed to a crippling depression in 1605 which probably led to his premature death at age forty-nine in 1609. Only a handful of oils can be dated to the later years of his life, including his monumental Pietd (London, National Gallery) which scholars generally date to 1604, or before his collapse. His commission for pictures to decorate the private chapel in the Palazzo Aldobrandini of 1603/4 was turned over to Albani, but Annibale did contribute the still celebrated Landscape with Flight into Egypt (Rome, Galleria Doria Pamphili), his last and perhaps most moving essay on the classical landscape. An indefatigable draughtsman, Annibale considered drawing as the foundation for his art (as did other artists) but he saw the study of the human model essential for the preparation of other works. From this orientation, remarkably precocious drawn portraits, model studies, landscape sketches, and compositional drawings survive. They clearly expose his interest in the specific as well as his emphasis on the essential, which forms the basis for the power found in Annibale's work. |
Samples of Work
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