#bellori

wip. decided to post this and talk a bit, since i have nothing else to post about atm and i’ll prob take some time to finish this.

this guy's name is Silvano Bellori, a Cardinal Bishop, who, unfortunately, became the sort-of father figure to Vincenzo after his initial caretaker passed. i’ve had him for 2 years now just sitting and not knowing what to do with him, but i can finally able to put him to use and make him a awful person.

Il 15 gennaio 1613 nasce a Roma Giovanni Pietro Bellori (1613-1696), storico dell’arte, autore delle “Vite de' pittori, scultori e architecti moderni” (1672). Fondamentale è anche “L'Idea del pittore, dello scultore e dell'architetto scelta dalle. bellezze naturali superiore alla Natura”. Strenuo difensore del classicismo e critico verso il naturalismo, ammirò profondamente Annibale Carracci, Guido Reni, Andrea Sacchi, Francois Duquesnoy, Nicolas Poussin e il suo pupillo Carlo Maratta. Disdegnò il genio di Gian Lorenzo Bernini e di Pietro da Cortona, non inserendoli nelle Vite. Presenti, seppure non del tutto apprezzati, sono invece Caravaggio, del quale è messa in evidenza la vita sregolata, e Peter Paul Rubens. Bellori rivestì importanti incarichi nella Roma seicentesca: fu segretario dell’Accademia di San Luca, curatore delle collezioni pontificie e bibliotecario di Cristina di Svezia. Bellori rappresenta il prototipo del critico d’arte militante.

By Costanza Beltrami

Antiquarian, theorist and biographer Giovanni Pietro Bellori was born on 15 January 1613 in Rome. His family was neither wealthy nor educated: his parents were emigrant Lombard farmers. Bellori’s intelligence impressed the antiquarian Francesco Angeloni (1559–1652), possibly an uncle, who adopted him. Thus, Bellori grew up in Angeloni’s private collection of classical and antiquarian objects, the Musaeum Romanum, popular among scholars and artists such as Nicholas Poussin (1594–1665), Bellori’s lifelong friend and painting teacher.

After his uncle’s death in 1654, Bellori started assembling his own art collection, acquiring coins, medals, and paintings by Titian, Tintoretto, Annibale Carracci. From 1670 he was curator of the classical collection of Pope Clement X, and from 1671 rector (secretary) of the Accademia di San Luca, where he promoted debate on art theory with a series of famous lectures. He established strong links between this institution and the Académie de France in Rome. In 1680, Bellori became the librarian and antiquary of Queen Christina of Sweden after her abdication and exile. He died in 1690, and was buried in San Isidoro, Rome.

Bellori’s greatest achievement was a collection of lives of contemporary artists, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni (1672), written to emulate and complete the work of Giorgio Vasari (1511–1574). Bellori was also motivated by spite against another Roman art historian, Giovanni Baglione (1566–1643), whose “mistakes” Bellori wished to correct. The Vite were dedicated to Jean-Baptiste Colbert (1619–1683), Minister of Finance during the reign of Louis XIV, patron of the arts and director of the Académie de France.

Reference: “Bellori, Giovanni [Pietro],” Dictionary of Art Historians, https://dictionaryofarthistorians.org/bellorig.html

Carlo Maratta, Portrait of Giovanni Bellori, oil on canvas, second half of the 17th century, Private collection.

Frontispiece of Giovanni Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni (Rome, 1672).

By Alexis Culotta 

Today, 3 November, is the birthday of famed Baroque painter Annibale Carracci in 1560. Carracci became one of the most celebrated painters of the Baroque era. According to 17th-century writer Giovanni Pietro Bellori, Annibale had “the most richly endowed temperament from which he developed his blessed genius, coupling two things rarely granted to men: nature and art in consummate excellence.” 

Born in Bologna, Annibale gleaned his earliest artistic training among members of his family. His brothers, fellow painters Agostino and Ludovico, shared with Annibale a fascination with both nature and color, the latter fostered by their study of Venetian masters such as Titian. For Annibale, this fascination evolved into an eclectic array of subject matter for his compositions. From genre scenes to mythological narratives, Annibale’s early compositions resonate within exploration of color, atmosphere, and emotion. 

Elements of the classical world became infused in Annibale’s work following his arrival in Rome in the late 1590s, a relocation spurred by the Duke of Parma’s recommendation of Annibale for a series of ceiling frescoes in the Palazzo Farnese. This visual program, first revealed at the dawn of the 17th century, became a benchmark in fresco design and set Annibale on course for a prolific future as one of the leading painters of the Baroque age. 

Further Reading: Bellori, Giovanni Pietro, and Hellmut Wohl, The Lives of the Modern Painters, Sculptors and Architects (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005). 

Self Portrait, 1590-1600. Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence. 

The Butcher’s Shop, 1580. Christ Church Picture Gallery, Oxford. 

Assumption of the Virgin, c. 1590. Museo del Prado, Madrid. 

È disponibile il nuovo numero di “Ricche Minere“, rivista semestrale diretta da Giuseppe Pavanello. Si tratta del terzo numero, il primo di quest’anno (vedi i precedenti). Per informazioni: www.riccheminere.org https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwMMs93QDfkwY0pnVFc2MVdyb2c/preview

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