Antonio Verrio (c. 1636 – 15 June 1707) was an Italian painter. He was responsible for introducing

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including ...

mural painting into

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

and served the Crown over a thirty-year period.British Art Journal, Volume X No. 3, Winter/Spring 2009/10

Career

Verrio, born in

Lecce Lecce ( ); el, label= Griko, Luppìu, script=Latn; la, Lupiae; grc, Λουπίαι, translit=Loupíai), group=pron is a historic city of 95,766 inhabitants (2015) in southern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Lecce, the provi ...

Kingdom of Naples The Kingdom of Naples ( la, Regnum Neapolitanum; it, Regno di Napoli; nap, Regno 'e Napule), also known as the Kingdom of Sicily, was a state that ruled the part of the Italian Peninsula south of the Papal States between 1282 and 1816. It was ...

, started his career in Lecce and was a pupil of Giovanni Andrea Coppola (1597–1659). Several works by Verrio still exist in the Apulian city, including ''S. Francesco Saverio appare al Beato Marcello Mastrilli'' – his first known signed work. Around 1665, Verrio moved to the region of Toulouse where he was commissioned to decorate the Château de Bonrepos, the property of

Pierre-Paul Riquet file:Stèle de Pierre Paul Riquet, baron de Bonrepos.jpg, Stele in Toulouse Cathedral Pierre-Paul Riquet, Baron de Bonrepos (29 June 1609 (some sources say 1604) – 4 October 1680) was the engineer and canal-builder responsible for the construct ...

, promoter of the Canal du Midi. He then settled in Toulouse itself where he worked for the Carmes Déchaussées and the Capucins. Today two of his paintings, ''Le Mariage de la Vierge'' et ''Saint-Félix de Cantalice'', are in the collection of the

Musée des Augustins The Musée des Augustins de Toulouse is a fine arts museum in Toulouse, France which conserves a collection of sculpture and paintings from the Middle Ages to the early 20th century. The paintings are from throughout France, the sculptures repr ...

there. Around 1670, Verrio moved to Paris where he developed an aristocratic clientele and decorated three private houses including the hotel Brûlart – the only one that still exists today (in private hands). In March 1672, Verrio crossed the Channel on the recommendation of Ralph Montagu, who had been English Ambassador Extraordinary in Paris since 1669. Thanks to Montagu, Verrio made his English debut working for aristocrats such as the 1st Earl of Arlington (Euston Hall and Arlington House, now destroyed) and the 1st Duke of Lauderdale (

Ham House Ham House is a 17th-century house set in formal gardens on the bank of the River Thames in Ham, south of Richmond in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames. The original house was completed in 1610 by Thomas Vavasour, an Elizabethan cou ...

, now a property of The National Trust), and rapidly acquired the royal patronage of Charles II. By 1675, Verrio had painted the exquisite allegorical portrait of the king known as ''The Sea Triumph of Charles II'', and was 'denizened' on 5 May of that year. Soon afterwards he was engaged to decorate the North Range of

Windsor Castle Windsor Castle is a royal residence at Windsor in the English county of Berkshire. It is strongly associated with the English and succeeding British royal family, and embodies almost a millennium of architectural history. The original c ...

, where he collaborated with the architect

Hugh May Hugh May (1621 – 21 February 1684) was an English architect in the period after the Restoration of King Charles II. He worked in the era which fell between the first introduction of Palladianism into England by Inigo Jones, and the full flower ...

and the sculptor

Grinling Gibbons Grinling Gibbons (4 April 1648 – 3 August 1721) was an Anglo-Dutch sculptor and wood carver known for his work in England, including Windsor Castle and Hampton Court Palace, St Paul's Cathedral and other London churches, Petworth House and othe ...

. This was the most important commission of his entire career: twenty ceilings, three staircases, the King's Chapel and St George's Hall for which he was paid the colossal sum of £10195 8s 4d. On its completion, in 1684, Verrio was appointed Chief First Painter. Only three ceilings have survived the redecoration of the castle commissioned by George IV during the 1820s. On the succession of James II, Verrio continued his royal service and decorated

Whitehall Palace The Palace of Whitehall (also spelt White Hall) at Westminster was the main residence of the English monarchs from 1530 until 1698, when most of its structures, except notably Inigo Jones's Banqueting House of 1622, were destroyed by fire. H ...

(burnt in 1698) and Henry VIII's Chapel at Windsor (destroyed). In March 1685, he was also appointed "Keeper of the Great Garden in St James's Park". At the Glorious Revolution, Verrio received no royal protection from William III and had to leave the court. Verrio, who had worked for the nobility while he was employed by Charles and James, returned to his aristocratic clientele. He spent the next decade at

Burghley House Burghley House () is a grand sixteenth-century English country house near Stamford, Lincolnshire. It is a leading example of the Elizabethan prodigy house, built and still lived in by the Cecil family. The exterior largely retains its Elizabet ...

, the property of the 5th Earl of Exeter, and

Chatsworth House Chatsworth House is a stately home in the Derbyshire Dales, north-east of Bakewell and west of Chesterfield, England. The seat of the Duke of Devonshire, it has belonged to the Cavendish family since 1549. It stands on the east bank of the ...

, the property of the 4th Earl of Devonshire. Both are very fine examples of English Baroque decoration, and Burghley contains Verrio's masterpiece, the Heaven Room. By 1699, William finally overrode the

Test Act The Test Acts were a series of English penal laws that served as a religious test for public office and imposed various civil disabilities on Roman Catholics and nonconformists. The underlying principle was that only people taking communion in ...

and invited Verrio back to court. After having worked at Windsor again, Verrio undertook the decoration of

Hampton Court Palace Hampton Court Palace is a Grade I listed royal palace in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, southwest and upstream of central London on the River Thames. The building of the palace began in 1514 for Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, the chie ...

for William. At his death, in 1702, Verrio continued his royal service and painted for Queen Anne his last royal commission in the Queen's Drawing Room. In 1705, Verrio was granted by the queen an annual pension of £200 and allowed to keep his lodgings at Hampton Court. Before his death, on 15 June 1707, Verrio painted a series of portraits including his self-portrait, now in the National Portrait Gallery. Verrio influenced younger artists such as

Louis Laguerre Louis Laguerre (1663 – 20 April 1721) was a French decorative painter mainly working in England. Born in Versailles in 1663 and trained at the Paris Academy under Charles Le Brun, he came to England in 1683, where he first worked with Anto ...

and

James Thornhill Sir James Thornhill (25 July 1675 or 1676 – 4 May 1734) was an English painter of historical subjects working in the Italian baroque tradition. He was responsible for some large-scale schemes of murals, including the "Painted Hall" at the Ro ...

, and his Hampton Court Palace frescoes (now under the care of

Historic Royal Palaces Historic Royal Palaces is an independent charity that manages some of the United Kingdom's unoccupied royal palaces. These are: * Tower of London * Hampton Court Palace * Kensington Palace (State Apartments and Orangery) * The Banqueting Hous ...

) constitute a priceless legacy.

Verrio's work

Verrio, Antonio — Sketch for the Ceiling of the Banqueting House, Hampton Court Palace (London)

Verrio's surviving decorative work in England can be seen at

Reigate Priory Reigate Priory is a Grade I listed building in Reigate Reigate ( ) is a town in Surrey, England, around south of central London. The settlement is recorded in Domesday Book in 1086 as ''Cherchefelle'' and first appears with its modern name in ...

Chelsea Hospital The Royal Hospital Chelsea is a retirement home and nursing home for some 300 veterans of the British Army. Founded as an almshouse, the ancient sense of the word "hospital", it is a site located on Royal Hospital Road in Chelsea. It is an in ...

Christ's Hospital Christ's Hospital is a public school (English independent boarding school for pupils aged 11–18) with a royal charter located to the south of Horsham in West Sussex. The school was founded in 1552 and received its first royal charter in 1553. ...

, Moor Park,

Powis Castle Powis Castle ( cy, Castell Powys) is a British medieval castle, fortress and grand country house near Welshpool, in Powys. The seat of the Herbert family, Earls of Powis, the castle is known for its formal gardens and for its interiors, the fo ...

Snape Castle Snape Castle is a semi-fortified manor house in the village of Snape, North Yorkshire, England. The castle is south of Bedale and north of Ripon. At the time of Henry VIII, John Leland described it as "...a goodly castel in a valley eonging ...

(although in very bad condition) and

. Some of his paintings, sketches and drawings belong to various collections including the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

Fitzwilliam Museum The Fitzwilliam Museum is the art and antiquities museum of the University of Cambridge. It is located on Trumpington Street opposite Fitzwilliam Street in central Cambridge. It was founded in 1816 under the will of Richard FitzWilliam, 7th V ...

, Cambridge, National Portrait Gallery, Northampton Museum and Art Gallery,

Royal Collection The Royal Collection of the British royal family is the largest private art collection in the world. Spread among 13 occupied and historic royal residences in the United Kingdom, the collection is owned by King Charles III and overseen by the ...

and the

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

. In France, his work can be seen in

Toulouse Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and fr ...

at the

musée des Augustins The Musée des Augustins de Toulouse is a fine arts museum in Toulouse, France which conserves a collection of sculpture and paintings from the Middle Ages to the early 20th century. The paintings are from throughout France, the sculptures repr ...

and at Saint Exupère's church and in

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. Si ...

, where he painted some of the vaults of the Hôtel Brûlart. In Italy, his paintings can be found in various churches and in the provincial museum of Lecce, his native city.

Gallery of Verrio's work

File:St George's Hall Windsor from W.H. Payne's Royal Residences (1819).jpg, St. George's Hall, Windsor Castle, showing Verrio's murals of the 1680s, destroyed in the early nineteenth century File:Windsor Castle, Royal Chapel, by Charles Wild, 1818 - royal coll 922113 313693 ORI 1.jpg, The Chapel Royal, Windsor Castle, showing Verrio's murals of the 1680s, destroyed in the early nineteenth century File:Great Staircase, Triumph of Semele, ceiling painted by Antonio Verrio, 1691, Chatsworth House - Derbyshire, England - DSC03132.jpg, Great Staircase, Chatsworth House, Triumph of Semele, ceiling painted 1691 File:Return of the Golden Age (Assembly of the Gods) by Antonio Verrio, 1691-1692 - Great Chamber, Chatsworth House - Derbyshire, England - DSC03152.jpg, Great Chamber, Chatsworth House, Return of the Golden Age (Assembly of the Gods), 1691–1692 File:Hampton Court stairs.jpg, The King's Staircase, Hampton Court Palace, murals 1701-02 File:Antonio Verrio (c. 1639-1707) - The Apotheosis of Catherine of Braganza - RCIN 408427 - Royal Collection.jpg, The Apotheosis of Catherine of Braganza, at Windsor Castle

References

* ''Antonio Verrio, His Career and surviving work'', British Art Journal, Volume X No. 3, Winter/Spring 2009/10, Special 10th Anniversary Double Issue * ''Antonio Verrio and the Royal image at Hampton Court'', British Art Journal, Volume X No. 3, Winter/Spring 2009/10, Special 10th Anniversary Double Issue * ''Antonio Verrio, Chroniques d'un peintre italien voyageur'', Musée des Augustins et Mairie de Toulouse, 2010. Catalogue of the exhibition on the artist at the Musée des Augustins, Toulouse, 27 March – 27 June 2010 * Raffaele De Giorgi,'' "Couleur, couleur!". Antonio Verrio: un pittore in Europa tra Seicento e Settecento'' (Edifir, Firenze 2009).

External links

British Art, Online Encyclopedia
2009 {{DEFAULTSORT:Verrio, Antonio 1636 births 1707 deaths 17th-century Italian painters Italian male painters 18th-century Italian painters 17th-century English painters English male painters 18th-century English painters Italian Baroque painters English people of Italian descent Italian emigrants to the Kingdom of England 18th-century English male artists 18th-century Italian male artists