Giuseppe Crespi

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Giuseppe Crespi : biography

March 14, 1665 – July 16, 1747

While many came to work in the studio Crespi established after Cignani’s departure, few became notable. Antonio Gionima was moderately successful. Others included Giovanni Francesco Braccioli, Giacomo Pavia, Giovanni Morini, Pier Guariente, and Cristoforo Terzi.Hobbes, 1849, p. 68 He may also have influenced Giovanni Domenico Ferretti. While the Venetian Giovanni Battista Piazzetta claimed to have studied under Crespi, the documentation for this is nonexistent.

Two of Crespi’s sons, Antonio (1712–1781) and Luigi (1708–1779) became painters. According to their account, Crespi may have used a camera obscura to aid in depiction of outdoor scenes in his later years. After his wife’s death, he became reclusive, rarely leaving the house except to go to daily mass.

Crespi and the genre style

Searching for Fleas Crespi is best known today as one of the main proponents of baroque genre painting in Italy. Italians, until the 17th century, had paid little attention to such themes, concentrating mainly on grander images from religion, mythology, and history, as well as portraiture of the mighty. In this they differed from Northern Europeans, specifically Dutch painters, who had a strong tradition in the depiction of everyday activities. There were exceptions: the Bolognese Baroque titan of fresco, Annibale Carracci, had painted pastoral landscapes, and depictions of homely tradespeople such as butchers. Before him, Bartolomeo Passerotti and the Cremonese Vincenzo Campi had dallied in genre subjects. In this tradition, Crespi also followed the precedents set forth by the Bamboccianti, mainly Dutch genre painters active in Rome. Subsequently this tradition would also be upheld by Piazzetta, Pietro Longhi, Giacomo Ceruti and Giandomenico Tiepolo to name a few.

He painted many kitchen scenes and other domestic subjects. The painting of The Flea (1709–10) depicts a young woman readying for sleep and supposedly grooming for a nagging pest on her person. The environs are squalid—nearby are a vase with a few flowers and a cheap bead necklace dangling on the wall—but she is sheltered in a tender womb of light. She is not a Botticellian beauty, but a mortal, her lapdog asleep on the bed-sheets.

In another genre scene, Crespi captures the anger of a woman at a man publicly urinating on wall, with a picaresque cat also objecting to the man’s indiscretion.

Giuseppe Maria Crespi 003.jpg|Searching for Fleas Giuseppe Maria Crespi – La cuoca, the kitchenmaid.jpg|Kitchenmaid Giuseppe Maria Crespi – Dice Players – WGA05756.jpg|Dice players Giuseppe Maria Crespi – The Courted Singer – WGA5773.jpg|The Courted Singer

Partial anthology of works

Crespi, Giuseppe Maria – Frau spielt Laute.jpg|Woman with Lute GM Crespi-Musée Bx-Arts-Strasbourg (2)-Pandurina.png|Woman with Pandurina Crespi, Giuseppe Maria – Count Fulvio Grati – 1700-1720.jpg|Count Fulvio Grati Lambertini.jpg|Cardinal Prospero Lambertini Giuseppe Maria Crespi, estasi di santa margherita da cortona, 1701.jpg|Exstasis of St Margaret of Cortona

  • The Marriage at Cana, Art Institute of Chicago
  • Holy Family (1688), Parish Church of Bergantino
  • Madonna del Carmine
  • Temptation of St. Anthony (1690), San Niccolò degli Albari, Bologna
  • Aeneas, The Sibyl and Charon, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
  • Hecuba blinding Polynestor, Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts, Brussels
  • Tarquin and Lucretia, National Gallery, Washington D.C.
  • The Triumph of Hercules, The Four Seasons, The Three Fates, Neptune and Diana, frescoes of Palazzo Pepoli Campogrande, Bologna
  • The Finding of Moses & David and Abigail, Museo di Palazzo Venezia, Rome
  • Love triumphant’ or L’Ingegno, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Strasbourg
  • Chiron Teaches Achilles, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria
  • The Ecstasy of Saint Margaret of Cortona (1701), Duomo, Bologna
  • Massacre of the Innocents (1706), Uffizi, Florence, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna, and National Gallery, Dublin
  • The Fair at Poggio a Caiano (1709), Uffizi
  • The Nurture of Jupiter (1729), Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth
  • Singer at Spinet with an Admirer (1730s), Uffizi
  • Village Fair with dentist (1715–20), Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
  • Series of The Seven Sacraments (1712), Gemäldegalerie, Dresden
  • Meeting between James Stuart and the Prince Albani, Národní Galerie, Prague
  • Annunciation with Saints (1722), Cathedral of Sarzana
  • The Crucifixion (Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan)
  • The Assumption of the Virgin (1730), Archivio Arcivescovile, Lucca
  • Two altarpieces for the church of the Gesù, Ferrara(1728–1729)
  • Four altarpieces for the parish church of San Paolo d’Argon, Bergamo (1728–1729)
  • Martyrdom of Saint John the Evangelist
  • Joshua Stopping the Sun (1737), Colleoni Chapel, Bergamo
  • Martyrdom of Saint Peter of Arbuès (1737), Collegio di Spagna, Bologna
  • Self-portrait, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna
  • The Family of Zanobio Troni, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna
  • The Lute Player, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
  • The Hunter, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna)
  • The Messenger, Staatliche Kunsthalle, Karlsruhe
  • Courtyard Scene, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna
  • Searching for Fleas,(Louvre); variants , , and Museo di Capodimonte, Naples
  • The Woman Washing Dishes, Galleria degli Uffizi
  • A Peasant Family with Boys Playing, London
  • Peasants Playing Musical Instruments, London
  • Peasants with Donkeys, London
  • Importunate Lovers, Hermitage
  • Peasant Flirtation, London
  • Menghina from the Garden meets Cacasenno
  • Music Library Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna
  • Cupids at Play, El Paso Museum of Art
  • Saint John Nepomuk Hears Confession from the Queen of Bohemia, Turin, Galleria Sabauda

"Man With Helmet",Nelson-Atkins Art Museum Kansas City,Missouri

The Seven Sacraments

One celebrated series of canvases, the Seven Sacraments, was painted around 1712, and now hangs in the Gemäldegalerie, Dresden. It was originally completed for Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni in Rome, and upon his death passed to the Elector of Saxony. These imposing works are painted with a loose brushstroke, but still maintain a sober piety. Making no use of hieratic symbols such as saints and putti, they utilize commonplace folk to illustrate sacramental activity.

The Seven Sacraments
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Baptism Confirmation Confession Communion Ordination Matrimony Extreme Unction

Notes