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The Carracci
The Carracci (/kəˈrɑːtʃi/ kə-RAH-chee, UK also /kəˈrætʃi/ kə-RATCH-ee, Italian: [karˈrattʃi] ⓘ) were a Bolognese family of artists that played an instrumental role in bringing forth the Baroque style in painting. Brothers Annibale (1560–1609) and Agostino (1557–1602) along with their cousin Ludovico (1555–1619) worked collaboratively. The Carracci family left their legacy in art theory by starting a school for artists in 1582. The school was called the Accademia degli Incamminati, and its main focus was to oppose and challenge Mannerist artistic practices and principles in order to create a renewed art of naturalism and expressive persuasion.
The artistic and theoretical activity of the Carracci is recognized by critics and historians such as André Chastel and Giulio Carlo Argan to have decisively contributed to the formation of the figurative Baroque and to new pictorial solutions based on the recuperation of the classical and Renaissance tradition, renewed by study of nature. "Jointly they effected an artistic reform that overthrew Mannerist aesthetics and initiated the Baroque."
The crisis of the culture of Catholicism was highlighted after the Protestant Reform (in 1517 Martin Luther expounded his 95 theses in Wittenberg), and the successive "sack of Rome" by the troops of Charles V in 1527, facts that rendered the papal capital more insecure and unstable, and less attractive to the artists of the Roman epoch who at the end of the 16th century were less inclined to produce a new artistic movement.
The mannerist art that wearily replicated the style of the masters of the Renaissance, emphasizing formal complications and virtuosity, no longer obeyed the need for clarity and devotion. Bologna was at the center of a territory in which the work of the artists traditionally had a pronounced devotional and pietistic character, and was influenced by north Italian and Venetian art. On these cultural and aesthetic bases the Carracci developed their work as theorists of artistic renewal, emphasizing the humanity of subjects and the clarity of the sacred scenes.
The eclecticism of their art, the respect for tradition and a language adapted to the public places frequented by the working classes satisfied the desires of the church of the Counter-Reformation that needed a new mode to express its primacy over the other religions and confirm that art could and had to be a vehicle towards faith.
The Carracci fit perfectly into the political and artistic moment of the epoch—they recognized the need for an artistic style that could reflect the new desires and that was free from the artifice and complexity of Mannerism.
Another principle of the Carracci doctrine was the devotional aspect, the respect of the orthodoxy of the represented history. The Carracci followed the instructions contained in the work of the theorists of the time such as the Cardinal Gabriele Paleotti, author in 1582 of De sacris et profanis imaginibus ("on sacred and profane images") which advocated for the control on the part of the ecclesiastic authority of the contents of the sacred scenes (the saints and their attributes had to be easily recognizable and respectful of the traditional, additionally the stories had to demonstrate fidelity towards the sacred texts), while the artists retained the "liberty" to choose the most suitable style.
Another point of reference was the work of Giovanni Andrea Gilio, author of Due Dialoghi...degli errori dei pittori ("two dialogues...on the errors of painters") in 1564 in which he criticized the excesses of refinement, of allegories and the bizarre inventions of the Mannerist art. The stories and the characters rendered lifelike in imitation of nature had to then be ennobled by the exercise of the art and refined on the example of the great masters of the past such as Raphael and Michelangelo, but also Titian, Veronese, Tintoretto, Correggio, and Parmigianino.
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The Carracci
The Carracci (/kəˈrɑːtʃi/ kə-RAH-chee, UK also /kəˈrætʃi/ kə-RATCH-ee, Italian: [karˈrattʃi] ⓘ) were a Bolognese family of artists that played an instrumental role in bringing forth the Baroque style in painting. Brothers Annibale (1560–1609) and Agostino (1557–1602) along with their cousin Ludovico (1555–1619) worked collaboratively. The Carracci family left their legacy in art theory by starting a school for artists in 1582. The school was called the Accademia degli Incamminati, and its main focus was to oppose and challenge Mannerist artistic practices and principles in order to create a renewed art of naturalism and expressive persuasion.
The artistic and theoretical activity of the Carracci is recognized by critics and historians such as André Chastel and Giulio Carlo Argan to have decisively contributed to the formation of the figurative Baroque and to new pictorial solutions based on the recuperation of the classical and Renaissance tradition, renewed by study of nature. "Jointly they effected an artistic reform that overthrew Mannerist aesthetics and initiated the Baroque."
The crisis of the culture of Catholicism was highlighted after the Protestant Reform (in 1517 Martin Luther expounded his 95 theses in Wittenberg), and the successive "sack of Rome" by the troops of Charles V in 1527, facts that rendered the papal capital more insecure and unstable, and less attractive to the artists of the Roman epoch who at the end of the 16th century were less inclined to produce a new artistic movement.
The mannerist art that wearily replicated the style of the masters of the Renaissance, emphasizing formal complications and virtuosity, no longer obeyed the need for clarity and devotion. Bologna was at the center of a territory in which the work of the artists traditionally had a pronounced devotional and pietistic character, and was influenced by north Italian and Venetian art. On these cultural and aesthetic bases the Carracci developed their work as theorists of artistic renewal, emphasizing the humanity of subjects and the clarity of the sacred scenes.
The eclecticism of their art, the respect for tradition and a language adapted to the public places frequented by the working classes satisfied the desires of the church of the Counter-Reformation that needed a new mode to express its primacy over the other religions and confirm that art could and had to be a vehicle towards faith.
The Carracci fit perfectly into the political and artistic moment of the epoch—they recognized the need for an artistic style that could reflect the new desires and that was free from the artifice and complexity of Mannerism.
Another principle of the Carracci doctrine was the devotional aspect, the respect of the orthodoxy of the represented history. The Carracci followed the instructions contained in the work of the theorists of the time such as the Cardinal Gabriele Paleotti, author in 1582 of De sacris et profanis imaginibus ("on sacred and profane images") which advocated for the control on the part of the ecclesiastic authority of the contents of the sacred scenes (the saints and their attributes had to be easily recognizable and respectful of the traditional, additionally the stories had to demonstrate fidelity towards the sacred texts), while the artists retained the "liberty" to choose the most suitable style.
Another point of reference was the work of Giovanni Andrea Gilio, author of Due Dialoghi...degli errori dei pittori ("two dialogues...on the errors of painters") in 1564 in which he criticized the excesses of refinement, of allegories and the bizarre inventions of the Mannerist art. The stories and the characters rendered lifelike in imitation of nature had to then be ennobled by the exercise of the art and refined on the example of the great masters of the past such as Raphael and Michelangelo, but also Titian, Veronese, Tintoretto, Correggio, and Parmigianino.