Caravaggisti

The Caravaggisti (or the "Caravagesques") were stylistic followers of the late 16th-century Italian Baroque painter Caravaggio. His influence on the new Baroque style that eventually emerged from Mannerism was profound. Caravaggio never established a workshop as most other painters did, and thus had no school to spread his techniques. Nor did he ever set out his underlying philosophical approach to art, the psychological realism which can only be deduced from his surviving work. But it can be seen directly or indirectly in the work of Rubens, Jusepe de Ribera, Bernini, and Rembrandt. Famous while he lived, Caravaggio himself was forgotten almost immediately after his death. Many of his paintings were reascribed to his followers, such as ''The Taking of Christ'', which was attributed to the Dutch painter Gerrit van Honthorst until 1990.

It wasn't until the 20th century that his importance to the development of Western art was rediscovered. In the 1920s Roberto Longhi once more placed him in the European tradition: "Ribera, Vermeer, La Tour and Rembrandt could never have existed without him. And the art of Delacroix, Courbet and Manet would have been utterly different". The influential Bernard Berenson stated: "With the exception of Michelangelo, no other Italian painter exercised so great an influence."

Italian

Rome

At the height of his popularity in Rome during the late 1590s and early 1600s, Caravaggio's dramatic new style influenced many of his peers in the Roman art world. The first Caravaggisti included Mario Minniti, Giovanni Baglione (although his Caravaggio phase was short-lived), Leonello Spada and Orazio Gentileschi. In the next generation, there were Carlo Saraceni, Bartolomeo Manfredi and Orazio Borgianni as well as anonymous masters such as the Master of the Gamblers. Gentileschi, despite being considerably older, was the only one of these artists to live much beyond 1620, and ended up as court painter to Charles I of England. His daughter Artemisia Gentileschi was also close to Caravaggio, and one of the most gifted of the movement, including the work ''Judith Slaying Holofernes''. Yet, in Rome and in Italy, it was not Caravaggio, but the influence of Annibale Carracci, blending elements from the High Renaissance and Lombard realism, which ultimately triumphed. Other artists active in Rome, worth mentioning, include Angelo Caroselli, Pier Francesco Mola, Tommaso Salini and Francesco Buoneri. Giacinto Brandi was active mainly in Rome and Naples. Dutch painter David de Haen was active in Rome between 1615 and 1622. Bartolomeo Cavarozzi was active in Rome, but worked in Madrid from 1617 to 1618-19, and is believed to have played a role in spreading Caravaggism in Spain.Museo del Prado
Enciclopedia - Voz: Cavarozzi, Bartolomeo
Accessed 3 December 2022J. Paul Getty Museum
Bartolomeo Cavarozzi
Accessed 3 December 2022

File:Giovanni Baglione - The Divine Eros Defeats the Earthly Eros - Google Art Project.jpg, Baglione – ''The Divine Eros Defeats the Earthly Eros'', ca. 1602, Gemäldegalerie
File:Christ amongst the Doctors, oil on canvas painting by Orazio Borgianni.jpg, Borgianni – ''Christ amongst the Doctors'', ca. 1605–1610
File:Carlo Saraceni 001.jpg, Saraceni – ''Judith with the Head of Holophernes'', 1610–1615, Kunsthistorisches Museum
File:Artemisia Gentileschi - Self-Portrait as a Lute Player.JPG, Artemisia Gentileschi – ''Self-Portrait as a Lute Player'', 1615–1617, Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art
File:Cavarozzi San Jerónimo y dos ángeles 1617. Óleo sobre lienzo. 116 x 173 cm. Galería Palatina. Palazzo Pitti.jpg, Bartolomeo Cavarozzi – ''The Holy Family with Saint Catherine of Alexandria'', 1618, Prado Museum

Naples

In May 1606 after the killing of Ranuccio Tomassoni, Caravaggio fled to Naples with a death sentence on his head. While there he completed several commissions, two major ones being the ''Madonna of the Rosary'', and '' The Seven Works of Mercy''. His work had a profound effect on the local artists and his brief stay in Naples produced a notable school of Neapolitan Caravaggisti, including Battistello Caracciolo, Bernardo Cavallino, Carlo Sellitto, Massimo Stanzione, Francesco Guarino, Mattia Preti, Andrea Vaccaro, Cesare Fracanzano and Antonio de Bellis. Giacinto Brandi was active mainly in Rome and Naples. The Caravaggisti movement there ended with a terrible outbreak of plague in 1656, but at the time Naples was a possession of Spain and the influence of Caravaggism had already spread there.

File:Giovanni B. CARACCIOLO (called Battistello) - Two youths with grapes - Google Art Project.jpg, Caracciolo – ''Two youths with grapes'', 1605–1610
File:Bernardo Cavallino - Hercules and Omphale - Google Art Project.jpg, Cavallino – ''Hercules and Omphale'', c. 1640
File:Carlo Sellitto Salomé recibe de Herodías la cabeza del Bautista.jpg, Sellitto – ''Salome with the Head of St John the Baptist''
File:Judith with the Head of Holofernes MET DT1446.jpg, Stanzione – ''Judith with the Head of Holofernes'', c. 1640
File:Mattia Preti 004.jpg, Mattia Preti – ''A Mother Entrusting Her Sons to Christ'', c. 1635–36
File:Sileno ebrio, por Cesare Fracanzano.jpg, Cesare Fracanzano – ''Drunken Silenus'', c. 1630–1635

Northern Italy

Marco Antonio Bassetti is known to have been in Rome in 1616, and may have arrived there two years earlier. In Rome he came under the influence of the paintings of Caravaggio and Orazio Borgianni. On his return to Verona he painted a St. Peter and Saints for the church of San Tomaso and a Coronation of the Virgin for Sant' Anastasia. He died from the plague in Verona in 1630.

Bernardo Strozzi, born and mainly active in Genoa and later Venice, is considered a principal founder of the Venetian Baroque style. In the 1620s Strozzi gradually abandoned his early Mannerist style in favor of a more personal style characterized by a new naturalism derived from the work of Caravaggio and his followers. The Caravaggist style of painting had been brought to Genoa both by Domenico Fiasella, after his return from Rome in 1617–18, and by followers of Caravaggio who spent time working in the city.

Italian painter Biagio Manzoni was active in Faenza. Italian painter Bartolomeo Schedoni from Reggio Emilia, Daniele Crespi from Milan and Luca Cambiasi, also known as Luca Cambiaso and Luca Cangiagio, the leading artist in Genoa in the 16th century, often depicted brilliantly lit figures set against a dark background. Felice Boselli, active in Piacenza, used contrast Caravaggisti lighting for his still-lifes. Tanzio da Varallo (or simply il Tanzio) was active mainly in Lombardy and Piedmont, including the Sacro Monte at Varallo Sesia, where he worked contemporaneously with Pier Francesco Mazzucchelli (il Morazzone). The Italian painter and engraver Bernardino Mei worked in his native Siena and in Rome, finding patronage above all in the Chigi family.

Central Italy

Pietro Ricchi (or il Lucchesino), born in Lucca, also often depicted brilliantly lit figures set against a dark background (see St. Sebastian).

Sicily

Mario Minniti was an Italian artist active in Sicily after 1606. He, at the age of 16, even posed for Caravaggio's painting ''Boy with a Basket of Fruit''.

Dutch

The Netherlands Institute for Art History lists 128 artists labelled "Caravaggisten". Dutch painter David de Haen was active in Rome between 1615 and 1622. Another artist worth mentioning is Paulus Bor, who initially painted rather Caravaggisti-like history paintings, but his works fast became marked by a classicism related to that of his townsman van Campen. Abraham Lambertsz van den Tempel is worth mentioning for his realism and contrasting lighting. Flemish-born painter Frans Badens was active in Amsterdam.

Utrecht

In the early 17th century Catholic artists from the Netherlands travelled to Rome as students and were profoundly influenced by the work of Caravaggio. On their return to the north this group, known as the "Utrecht Caravaggisti", had a short-lived but influential flowering in the 1620s among painters like Hendrick ter Brugghen, Gerrit van Honthorst, Andries Both and Dirck van Baburen. The brief flourishing of Utrecht Caravaggism ended around 1630, when major artists had either died, as in the case of Baburen and Terbrugghen, or had changed style, like van Honthorst's shift to portraiture and history scenes informed by the Flemish tendencies popularized by Rubens and his followers. In the following generation the effects of Caravaggio, although attenuated, are to be seen in the work of Vermeer, Rembrandt, and Gerrit Dou's "niche paintings".

File:Dirk van Baburen - Kroning met de doornenkroon.jpg, Van Baburen – ''Christ with the crown of thorns'', 1623
File:Jan van Bijlert.jpg, Van Bijlert – ''Concert'', 1630–1635
File:Honthorst, Gerard van - Merry Company - 1623.jpg, Van Honthorst – ''Merry Company'', 1623
File:MatthiasStom-SaintJerome-Nantes.jpg, Stom – ''Saint Jerome''

Flemish

Rubens was likely one of the first Flemish artists to be influenced by Caravaggio. During the period 1600–1608, Rubens resided in Italy. He settled in Mantua at the court of Duke Vincenzo I Gonzaga but also spent time in Rome. During his stay in Rome in 1601 he became acquainted with Caravaggio’s work. He later made a copy of Caravaggio's ''Entombment of Christ'' and recommended his patron, the Duke of Mantua, to purchase ''The Death of the Virgin'' (Louvre). Rubens was after his return to Antwerp instrumental in the acquisition of Caravagio's ''Madonna of the Rosary'' (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna) for the St. Paul's Church in Antwerp. During his stay in Italy Rubens broadened his interest in Caravaggio’s work to include the 1606 '' Supper at Emmaus in Milan'' (Pinacoteca di Brera) and the 1600 ''The Calling of St Matthew'' as well as the more recent work in the Santa Maria in Vallicella and the Basilica of Sant'Agostino. Although some of this interest in Caravaggio is reflected in his drawings during his Italian residence, it was only after his return to Antwerp in 1608 that his works show openly Caravaggesque traits such as in the '' Cain slaying Abel'' (1608-1609) (Courtauld Institute of Art). However, the influence of Caravaggio on Rubens’ work would be less important than that of Raphael, Correggio, Barocci and the Venetians. Artists, who were influenced by Rubens, such as Pieter van Mol, Gaspar de Crayer and Willem Jacob Herreyns, also used certain stark realism and strong contrasts of light and shadow, common to Caravaggisti style.

Rubens' contemporary Abraham Janssens was another Flemish painter who travelled to Italy (from 1597 to 1602) where he became acquainted with the work of Caravaggio. His work after his return to Antwerp shows the influence of Caravaggio. The composition '' Scaldis and Antwerpia'' of 1609 derives its expressive power from the use of strong contrasts of light and shadow (chiaroscuro) as was pioneered by Caravaggio.Roger A. d'Hulst, ''Abraham Janssens - Scaldis en Antwerpia''
at Openbaar Kunstbezit Vlaanderen

It is mainly the Flemish artists from the generation after Rubens coming on the art scene in the 1620s who were most influenced by Caravaggio. It can even be said that there was a Caravaggist craze in Flanders from about 1620 to 1640. The artists are often referred to as the Ghent Caravaggisti and the Antwerp Caravaggisti after the city in which they were principally active. There is, however, no discernible stylistic distinction between these two movements other than individual ones. Among the Ghent Caravaggisti can be listed Jan Janssens