The Italian painter and
engraver Bernardino Mei (1612/15 – 1676) worked in a
Baroque manner in his native
Siena
Siena ( , ; lat, Sena Iulia) is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena.
The city is historically linked to commercial and banking activities, having been a major banking center until the 13th and 14th centuri ...
and in
Rome
, established_title = Founded
, established_date = 753 BC
, founder = King Romulus (legendary)
, image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg
, map_caption ...
, finding patronage above all in the
Chigi Chigi may refer to:
* Chigi (dog), a crossbreed between a Welsh Corgi and a chihuahua (dog)
* House of Chigi
The House of Chigi () is an Italian princely family of Sienese origin descended from the counts of Ardenghesca, which possessed castles ...
family.
Briefly a pupil of the Sienese
cartographer
Cartography (; from grc, χάρτης , "papyrus, sheet of paper, map"; and , "write") is the study and practice of making and using maps. Combining science, aesthetics and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality (or an im ...
and draughtsman
Giuliano Periccioli, where he learned the art of engraving, Bernardino passed to the studio of the painter
Rutilio Manetti
Rutilio di Lorenzo Manetti (c. 1571 – 22 July 1639) was an Italian painter of late-Mannerism or proto-Baroque, active mainly in Siena.
Biography
He was influenced and/or taught by the local artists Francesco Vanni and Ventura Salimbeni. He is k ...
and probably also served in the workshop of
Francesco Rustici
Francesco Rustici, called Il Rustichino (Siena, 1592 – Siena, 1626) was an Italian painter active in Siena. He worked on commissions for the local churches as well as from the Grand-Dukes of Tuscany. In his work he shows a preference for noc ...
.
He painted in and around
Siena
Siena ( , ; lat, Sena Iulia) is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena.
The city is historically linked to commercial and banking activities, having been a major banking center until the 13th and 14th centuri ...
, where his work came to the attention of Cardinal Fabio Chigi, who, once elected pope as
Alexander VII
Pope Alexander VII ( it, Alessandro VII; 13 February 159922 May 1667), born Fabio Chigi, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 7 April 1655 to his death in May 1667.
He began his career as a vice- papal legate, an ...
(1655), called Bernardino Mei to Rome in 1657. There Bernardino came under the influences of
Mattia Preti
Mattia Preti (24 February 1613 – 3 January 1699) was an Italian Baroque artist who worked in Italy and Malta. He was appointed a Member of the Order of Saint John.
Life
Born in the small town of Taverna in Calabria, Preti was called ''Il Cava ...
,
Andrea Sacchi
Andrea Sacchi (30 November 159921 June 1661) was an Italian painter of High Baroque Classicism, active in Rome. A generation of artists who shared his style of art include the painters Nicolas Poussin and Giovanni Battista Passeri, the sculptors ...
and
Pier Francesco Mola
Pier Francesco Mola, called Il Ticinese (9 February 1612 – 13 May 1666) was an Italian painter of the High Baroque, mainly active around Rome.
Biography
Mola was born at Coldrerio (now in Ticino, Switzerland).''Ecstasy in the Wilderness: Pier ...
, and of
Guercino
Giovanni Francesco Barbieri (February 8, 1591 – December 22, 1666),Miller, 1964 better known as Guercino, or il Guercino , was an Italian Baroque painter and draftsman from Cento in the Emilia region, who was active in Rome and Bologna. The vig ...
, to the extent that until the 20th century Bernardino's fresco of ''Aurora'' in Palazzo Bianchi Bandinelli was attributed to Guercino himself. Through the fast friendship that bonded him to
Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Gian Lorenzo (or Gianlorenzo) Bernini (, , ; Italian Giovanni Lorenzo; 7 December 159828 November 1680) was an Italian sculptor and architect. While a major figure in the world of architecture, he was more prominently the leading sculptor of his ...
, whose studio he frequented, he applied that sculptor's sense of theatrical action to his own mythological and allegorical subjects. He died in Rome in 1676.
![Bernardino Mei](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ec/Bernardino_Mei.jpg)
In the 19th century, Bernardino was dismissed as a tame follower of greater lights, but his painting was re-evalued in the later 20th century,
[He is still "a second-rate Sienese painter" in ]Francis Haskell
Francis James Herbert Haskell, (7 April 1928 – 18 January 2000) was an English art historian, whose writings placed emphasis on the social history of art. He wrote one of the first and most influential patronage studies, ''Patrons and Painte ...
, ''Patrons and Painters'', 1980:154. expressed in the exhibition ''Bernardino Mei e la pittura barocca a Siena'', Siena, 1987.
Notes
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mei, Bernardino
Italian Baroque painters
Painters from Siena
1676 deaths
Year of birth unknown
Year of birth uncertain