Sebastiano Bombelli (October 1635; 4 May 1719) was an Italian painter, mainly active in
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. The isla ...
, during the
Baroque period.
Biography
![Ritratto di Antonio Carli, 1670 (fondazione CRUP)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cf/Ritratto_di_Antonio_Carli%2C_1670_%28fondazione_CRUP%29.jpg)
He was born in
Udine
Udine ( , ; fur, Udin; la, Utinum) is a city and ''comune'' in north-eastern Italy, in the middle of the Friuli Venezia Giulia region, between the Adriatic Sea and the Alps (''Alpi Carniche''). Its population was 100,514 in 2012, 176,000 with t ...
on 14 or 15 October 1635 (baptized on the 15th), educated and trained under the guidance of his father Valentino and the godfather Girolamo Lugaro, he moved from a young age to
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. The isla ...
where, after a period of specialization with
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 vi ...
in
Bologna
Bologna (, , ; egl, label=Emilian language, Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 1 ...
, he began his career studying the manner of
Paolo Veronese, quickly becoming one of his greatest connoisseurs.
The synthesis of the techniques of
Cinquecento, of the impulse given by
naturalists and of the contemporary taste of the "tenebrosi" was addressed by Bombelli in the sector in which he specialized most, namely
portrait
A portrait is a painting, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expressions are predominant. The intent is to display the likeness, personality, and even the mood of the person. For this r ...
ure. Not to underestimate his stay in
Florentine, during which he was able to appreciate the technique of
Sustermans.
His first surviving work dates back to 1665, it is the '' Portrait of Benedetto Mangilli ''(Civici Musei, Galleria d'Arte Antica, Udine), a painting that shows influences from
Bernardo Strozzi
Bernardo Strozzi, named il Cappuccino and il Prete Genovese (c. 1581 – 2 August 1644) was an Italian Baroque painter and engraver. A canvas and fresco artist, his wide subject range included history, allegorical, genre and portrait paintin ...
.
Among the peculiar characteristics of his works emerge vitality, expressiveness and communicability, both in the portraits anchored to the tradition
Baroque like the '' Polo Querini '' of 1684 (
Querini Stampalia Foundation, Venice) and in the most simplified ones. His characters emerge from the shadows although described to the smallest detail, showy with their showy and festive attires.
Del 1675 is the first '' Self-portrait '' (Civici Musei, Galleria d'Arte Antica, Udine), characterized by a marked introspective vein and free from the embellishments typical of the '' official portrait '' which had made it famous to Venice.
![Ritratto di Isabella del Sera, 1671c (Uffizi, Firenze)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5d/Ritratto_di_Isabella_del_Sera%2C_1671c_%28Uffizi%2C_Firenze%29.jpg)
One of his many followers was
Fra' Galgario (Giuseppe Vittore Ghislandi) who spent a decade in Venice and had the opportunity to meet and collaborate with Bombelli. For a time he also studied in his workshop a young man
Anton Domenico Gabbiani, who learned much from Bombelli (see his first portraits, like those of the '' Musicians of the court of the Grand Prince Ferdinando de 'Medici '' at the
Galleria dell'Accademia
The Galleria dell'Accademia di Firenze, or "Gallery of the Academy of Florence", is an art museum in Florence, Italy. It is best known as the home of Michelangelo's sculpture ''David''. It also has other sculptures by Michelangelo and a large ...
); the two artists remained on excellent terms throughout their lives, as demonstrated by a beautiful letter from Bombelli addressed to the former student in 1716. He was also the master of
Domenico
Domenico is an Italian given name for males and may refer to:
People
* Domenico Alfani, Italian painter
* Domenico Allegri, Italian composer
* Domenico Alvaro, Italian mobster
* Domenico Ambrogi, Italian painter
* Domenico Auria, Italian archit ...
and Giovanni Battista Parodi, sons of the Genoese sculptor
Filippo Parodi, a personal friend of the friulian painter; Bombelli's fame as a skilled portrait painter was known internationally, so much so that one of his pupils was
Johann Gottfried Tannauer
Johann Gottfried Tannauer, or Dannhauer (1680, Saxony -1733/37, Saint Petersburg) was a German painter, portraitist and miniaturist who worked in Russia after 1711.
Biography
He began as a watchmaker in Swabia, then studied music, but finally t ...
, famous painter and miniaturist at the court of
Tsar
Tsar ( or ), also spelled ''czar'', ''tzar'', or ''csar'', is a title used by East and South Slavic monarchs. The term is derived from the Latin word ''caesar'', which was intended to mean "emperor" in the European medieval sense of the ter ...
Peter the Great of Russia
Peter I ( – ), most commonly known as Peter the Great,) or Pyotr Alekséyevich ( rus, Пётр Алексе́евич, p=ˈpʲɵtr ɐlʲɪˈksʲejɪvʲɪtɕ, , group=pron was a Russian monarch who ruled the Tsardom of Russia from t ...
. He was also very fond of friendship and affection with the fellow
Luca Carlevarijs
Luca Carlevarijs or Carlevaris (20 January 1663 – 12 February 1730) was an Italian painter and engraver working mainly in Venice. He pioneered the genre of the cityscapes (''vedute'') of Venice, a genre that was later widely followed by artis ...
and with the young and promising
Rosalba Carriera
Rosalba Carriera (12 January 1673 – 15 April 1757) was a Venetian Rococo painter. In her younger years, she specialized in portrait miniatures. Carriera would later become known for her pastel portraits, helping popularize the medium in eigh ...
, of whom he painted an intense portrait on the occasion of his appointment to
Academia di San Luca. His portraiture style later also influenced other painters, including
Alessandro Longhi
Alessandro Longhi (12 June 1733 – November 1813) was a Venetian portrait painter and printmaker in etching (mostly reproductions of paintings). He is known best for his oil portraits of Venetian nobles of state. His father was the famed g ...
and
Niccolò Cassana
Niccolò Cassana (often called Nicoletto; 1659–1714) was an Italian painter born in Venice and active during the late-Baroque. His older brother Giovanni Agostino Cassana was also a painter.
He trained with his father, Giovanni Francesco Cass ...
.
Bombelli had a half brother, Raffaele, also a painter, less well known than Sebastiano and active in the Friuli area.
![Maximilian Philipp Hieronymus von Bayern-Leuchtenberg](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7f/Maximilian_Philipp_Hieronymus_von_Bayern-Leuchtenberg.jpg)
The artist also traveled and worked abroad, for example in
Bavaria
Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total lan ...
, where he portrayed the Elector
Ferdinand Maria of Bavaria
Ferdinand Maria (31 October 1636 – 26 May 1679) was a Wittelsbach ruler of Bavaria and an elector ('' Kurfürst'') of the Holy Roman Empire from 1651 to 1679.
Electoral Prince of Bavaria
He was born in Munich. He was the eldest son of Maximi ...
, his wife
Enrichetta Adelaide di Savoia, the children
Maria Anna Vittoria of Bavaria,
Maximilian II Emanuel of Bavaria
Maximilian, Maximillian or Maximiliaan (Maximilien in French) is a male given name.
The name " Max" is considered a shortening of "Maximilian" as well as of several other names.
List of people
Monarchs
*Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor (1459 ...
,
Joseph Clement of Bavaria and his brother
Maximilian Philip Jerome of Bavaria, to Innsbruch portraying the Archduchess
Anna de 'Medici and the daughters
Claudia Felicita of Austria (future emperor's Leopold I second wife) and Mary Magdalene, for the
dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg
Duke is a male title either of a monarch ruling over a duchy, or of a member of royalty, or nobility. As rulers, dukes are ranked below emperors, kings, grand princes, grand dukes, and sovereign princes. As royalty or nobility, they are ran ...
, as well as
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
where he portrayed the emperor
Leopold I of Habsburg
Leopold I (Leopold Ignaz Joseph Balthasar Franz Felician; hu, I. Lipót; 9 June 1640 – 5 May 1705) was Holy Roman Emperor, King of Hungary, Croatia, and Bohemia. The second son of Ferdinand III, Holy Roman Emperor, by his first wife, Maria ...
and the couple
Joseph I of Habsburg and
Wilhelmina Amalia of Brunswick-Lüneburg
Wilhelmine Amalie of Brunswick-Lüneburg (21 April 1673 – 10 April 1742) was Holy Roman Empress, Queen of the Germans, Queen of Hungary, Queen of Bohemia, Archduchess consort of Austria etc. as the spouse of Joseph I, Holy Roman Emperor.
...
, was also active in
Florence
Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany Regions of Italy, region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilan ...
,
Mantua
Mantua ( ; it, Mantova ; Lombard and la, Mantua) is a city and '' comune'' in Lombardy, Italy, and capital of the province of the same name.
In 2016, Mantua was designated as the Italian Capital of Culture. In 2017, it was named as the Eur ...
and
Parma
Parma (; egl, Pärma, ) is a city in the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna known for its architecture, music, art, prosciutto (ham), cheese and surrounding countryside. With a population of 198,292 inhabitants, Parma is the second mos ...
and lent his service to some cardinals.
. His atelier in Venice was very famous and frequented by important personalities passing through Venice, in particular during
Carnival: on this occasion he portrayed the prince in 1692
Frederick of Denmark (future king Frederick IV).
Sebastiano Bombelli was also an art expert: being the greatest connoisseur of Paolo Veronese, he was often contacted to verify the authenticity of works that surfaced on the market. Concurrently with this activity, Bombelli was also a restorer. Unfortunately, to give new brilliance to ancient artworks, he used paints and lacquers that - with the passing of time - oxidized blackening the paint film. Various sources, contemporary and non-contemporary, refer to this information, in particular
Lanzi. His mastery of the use of colors, however, was much appreciated, to the extent that he was the dedicatee of the text ''Nuovo plico d'ogni sorte di tinture'' by Gallipido Tallier - published in 1704 - and the painter was addressed with these words «... knowing the world the virtue, which she generally possesses of coloring and painting; And I am going to say, that the opre of his penoron have a not that of celestial, which dazzles the sight to whom they aim ...».
He was a member of the
fraglia pictorial of Venice from 1687 to 1700.
Infirm in the last years of his life, he died in Venice on 4 May 1719. His executors were the beloved and powerful nephews Paolo
and Girolamo Celotti, both
Servite friars.
Notes
Bibliography
*
*John Steer, ''A Concise History of Venetian Painting'', Thames and Hudson, 1970, p. 131
*
Michael Bryan, ''Dictionary of Painters and Engravers, Biographical and Critical'' Vol. I: A-K, Robert Edmund Graves, p. 150, London, 1886, url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4GYCAAAAYAAJ&printsec=titlepage&dq=DICTIONARY+AACHEN+AALST&as_brr=1
*
* Aldo Rizzi, ''Mostra del Bombelli e del Carneo'', Doretti -Udine 1964
*
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bombelli, Sebastiano
1635 births
1719 deaths
People from Udine
17th-century Italian painters
Italian male painters
18th-century Italian painters
Italian Baroque painters
Italian portrait painters
Painters from Venice
18th-century Italian male artists