Tommaso Maria Conca (1734–1822), was an Italian painter and draftsman, active mostly in Rome.

Biography

Tommaso Conca was born in

Gaeta Gaeta (; lat, Cāiēta; Southern Laziale: ''Gaieta'') is a city in the province of Latina, in Lazio, Southern Italy. Set on a promontory stretching towards the Gulf of Gaeta, it is from Rome and from Naples. The town has played a consp ...

, one of the youngest of some eleven siblings, to

Giovanni Conca Giovanni may refer to: * Giovanni (name), an Italian male given name and surname * Giovanni (meteorology), a Web interface for users to analyze NASA's gridded data * ''Don Giovanni'', a 1787 opera by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, based on the legend of ...

and Anna Laura Scarsella di Castro. His father was a painter and cousin to the more famous painter Sebastiano Conca; the two were Tommaso's first teachers in

Baroque painting Baroque painting is the painting associated with the Baroque cultural movement. The movement is often identified with Absolutism, the Counter Reformation and Catholic Revival,Accademia di San Luca The Accademia di San Luca (the "Academy of Saint Luke") is an Italian academy of artists in Rome. The establishment of the Accademia de i Pittori e Scultori di Roma was approved by papal brief in 1577, and in 1593 Federico Zuccari became its fir ...

, Rome's guild of painters. Conca, Tommaso - Sacrificio a Sileno (detail) - 1775-1778

From 1775 to 1782 he worked for Marcantonio Borghese, painting the ceilings of two rooms in the renovated

Galleria Borghese The Galleria Borghese () is an art gallery in Rome, Italy, housed in the former Villa Borghese Pinciana. At the outset, the gallery building was integrated with its gardens, but nowadays the Villa Borghese gardens are considered a separate tourist ...

, in collaboration with Giovanni Battista Marchetti. In ''Sala del Sileno'', above a Roman statue of Silenus he set scenes from that character, along with Bacchus and his followers.
pg. 184
/ref> In the ''Sala Egizia'', dedicated to Egyptian sculpture, he represented the

Nile The Nile, , Bohairic , lg, Kiira , Nobiin language, Nobiin: Áman Dawū is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa and has historically been considered ...

, Cybele and astronomical bodies, adorning the space between them with mock Egyptian idols; on the walls he added eight scenes of Egyptian religion and the lives of

Marcus Antonius Marcus Antonius (14 January 1 August 30 BC), commonly known in English as Mark Antony, was a Roman politician and general who played a critical role in the transformation of the Roman Republic from a constitutional republic into the autoc ...

and

Cleopatra Cleopatra VII Philopator ( grc-gre, Κλεοπάτρα Φιλοπάτωρ}, "Cleopatra the father-beloved"; 69 BC10 August 30 BC) was Queen of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt from 51 to 30 BC, and its last active ruler.She was also a ...

.Moreno and Stefani (2000)
pg. 170
/ref> Vatican Museums 2011 21

Between 1782 and 1787 Conca painted ''Apollo and the Muses'', a

fresco Fresco (plural ''frescos'' or ''frescoes'') is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaste ...

decorating Sala delle Muse, a room in the papal

Museo Pio-Clementino The Vatican Museums ( it, Musei Vaticani; la, Musea Vaticana) are the public museums of the Vatican City. They display works from the immense collection amassed by the Catholic Church and the papacy throughout the centuries, including several of ...

. At the end of his life, he completed another fresco in the Vatican's Museo Chiaramonti, which celebrates the restitution of paintings that had been taken to

Musée Napoléon The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

. Following Anton Raphael Mengs he shifted to a Neoclassical style. One of his pupils was

Camillo Guerra Camillo Guerra (Naples 21 May 1797 – 10 March 1874 Naples) was an Italian painter, active mainly in Naples, Italy. Biography Born to a family of artists; his father, however, led a crew performing excavations at Pompei. Initially his father ...

External links

Tommaso Conca
on ''Personaggi di Roma'' database

References

1734 births 1822 deaths 18th-century Italian painters Italian male painters 19th-century Italian painters Italian Baroque painters Italian neoclassical painters People from Gaeta Painters from Rome 19th-century Italian male artists 18th-century Italian male artists {{Italy-painter-18thC-stub