Redefining Eclecticism in Early Modern Bolognese Painting

V I S U A L A N D M AT E R I A L C U LT U R E , 13 0 0 -17 0 0
Daniel M. Unger
Redefining Eclecticism
in Early Modern
Bolognese Painting
Ideology, Practice,
and Criticism
Redefining Eclecticism in Early Modern Bolognese Painting
Visual and Material Culture, 1300–1700
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www.allisonlevy.com.
Redefining Eclecticism in Early Modern
Bolognese Painting
Ideology, Practice, and Criticism
Daniel M. Unger
Amsterdam University Press

This book is published with the support of the Israel Science Foundation.
Cover illustration: Guido Reni, Alliance between Disegno and Colore, 1620/5, Louvre, Paris (Photo: © Author).
Cover design: Coördesign, Leiden

Lay-out: Newgen/Konvertus
isbn 978 94 6298 601 5

e-isbn 978 90 4853 725 9
doi 10.5117/9789462986015
nur 685
© D.M. Unger/ Amsterdam University Press B.V., Amsterdam 2019
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For Dina
Contents
List of Plates and Figures 9

Preface13
Introduction17
1. Defining Eclecticism 33
Assimilated Eclecticism – Vasari’s Raphael 41
Arbitrary Eclecticism 46
Non-Assimilated Eclecticism – A Definition 48
2. Ideology 57
Gabriele Paleotti’s Discourse on Sacred Images 62
A Pictorial Manifest: Alliance between Disegno and Colore75
Carlo Cesare Malvasia and the Assemblage of Styles 88
3. Practice 105
The Terrestrial and Celestial Realms 106
Portraits of Saints: St. Carlo Borromeo’s Effigy128
Other Eclectic Paintings 141
4. Criticism 159
Winckelmann’s Introduction of Eclecticism into Artistic Discourse 160
The Nineteenth-Century juste milieu168
The Dismissal of Eclecticism in the Twentieth Century 179
Conclusion207
The Eclectic Approach 207
Epilogue209
Eclecticism in a Roman Chapel 209
Index225
List of Plates and Figures
Colour Plates
Plate 1. Ludovico Carracci, St. Michael and St. George, 1595, Santi Gregorio e Siro,
Bologna (Photo: © Archivio Fotografico del Polo Museale dell’Emilia
Romagna / Orselli).
Plate 2. Guercino, Disegno and Colore, 1656/7, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister,
Dresden (Photo: © bpk-Bildagentur).
Plate 3. Guido Reni, Alliance between Disegno and Colore (detail), 1620/5, Louvre,
Paris (Photo: © Author).
Plate 4. Ludovico Carracci, The Madonna Appearing to St. Hyacinth, 1594, Louvre,
Paris (Photo: © RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / image RMN-GP).
Plate 5. Guercino, St. Peter Standing before the Madonna, 1647, Louvre, Paris
(Photo: © RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / Gérard Blot).
Plate 6. Guercino, St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in Purgatory
(detail), 1647, San Paolo Maggiore, Bologna (Two Angels pulling Souls
from Purgatory) (Photo: © Author).
Plate 7. Guido Reni, Pietà dei Mendicanti, 1613/16, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna
(Photo: © Archivio Fotografico del Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna /
Quattrone).
Plate 8. Annibale Carracci, Madonna and Child Enthroned with St. John the
Baptist, St. John the Evangelist and St. Catherine of Alexandria, 1593,
Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Black & White Figures
Figure 1. Parmigianino, Vision of St. Jerome, 1526/7, The National Gallery, London
(Photo: © The National Gallery, London).
Figure 2. Giacopo Giovannini after Guido Reni, The Farmers Presenting Gifts to
St. Benedict, engraving, 1694, in: Carlo Cesare Malvasia, Il claustro di San
Michele in Bosco di Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Figure 3. Domenichino, The Rebuke of Adam and Eve, 1623/5, Musée de peinture et
de sculpture, Grenoble (Photo: Ville de Grenoble / Musée de Grenoble –
J. L. Lacroix).
Figure 4. Guido Reni, Alliance between Disegno and Colore, 1620/5, Louvre, Paris
(Photo: © Author).
Figure 5. Guido Reni, The Archangel St. Michael, 1635, Santa Maria della
Concezione, Rome (Photo: Public domain via Wikimedia Commons).
10 REDEFINING ECLEC TICISM IN EARLY MODERN BOLOGNESE PAINTING
Figure 6. Guercino, Abraham Casting out Hagar and Ishmael, 1657/8, Pinacoteca di
Brera, Milan (Photo: Pinacoteca di Brera, Milano – Ministero per i beni e
le attività culturali).
Figure 7. Guercino, Self-Portrait before a Painting of ‘Amor Fedele’, 1655, National
Gallery of Art, Washington, D. C. (Photo: Patrons’ Permanent Fund
Accession No.2005.13.1).
Figure 8. Nicholas Poussin, Self-Portrait, 1650, Louvre, Paris (Photo: © RMN-Grand
Palais (musée du Louvre) / Jean-Gilles Berizzi).
Figure 9. Annibale Carracci, Jason Carried in a Coffin to Cheiron’s Cave, 1583/4,
Palazzo Fava, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Figure 10. Ludovico Carracci, St. Jerome, 1596/8, San Martino Maggiore, Bologna
Fotofast).
Figure 11. Lorenzo Costa, Ascension of the Madonna, 1506, San Martino Maggiore,
Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Figure 12. Guido Reni, Madonna and Child with St. Mary Magdalene and
St. Hyacinth, Private Collection (Photo: © Archivio Fotografico del Polo
Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Matteuzzi).
Figure 13. Ludovico Carracci, The Madonna of the Scalzi, 1590/3, Pinacoteca
Nazionale, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Figure 14. Annibale Carracci, Three Marys at the Tomb, 1600, Hermitage,
St. Petersburg (Photo: © The State Hermitage Museum. Photo by Pavel
Demidov).
Figure 15. Annibale Carracci, Pietà, 1603, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
(Photo: Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna).
Figure 16. Guido Reni, Assumption of the Virgin with the Twelve Apostles, 1616/17,
Sant’Ambrogio, Genoa (Photo: After D. Stephen Pepper, Guido Reni: A
Complete Catalogue of His Works, New York: New York University Press,
1984).
Figure 17. Guido Reni, Madonna and Child with Beato Filippo Neri, 1614, Santa Maria
in Vallicella (Chiesa Nuova), Rome (Photo: After La regola e la fama: San
Filippo Neri e l’Arte exh. cat., Milan: Electa, 1995).
Figure 18. Ludovico Carracci, Holy Family with Saints and Donors, 1591, Pinacoteca
Civica, Cento (Photo: © Archivio Fotografico del Polo Museale
dell’Emilia Romagna / Villani).
Figure 19. Guercino, St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in Purgatory, 1647,
San Paolo Maggiore, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Figure 20. Guercino, St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in Purgatory
(detail), 1647, San Paolo Maggiore, Bologna (St. Gregory the Great)
(Photo: © Author).
List of Plates and Figures 11
Figure 21. Ludovico Carracci, Paradise, 1616, San Paolo Maggiore, Bologna (Photo:
© Archivio Fotografico del Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna /
Liverani).
Figure 22. Guido Reni, Pietà dei Mendicanti (detail), 1613/16, Pinacoteca Nazionale,
Bologna (St. Carlo Borromeo) (Photo: © Author).
Figure 23. Lorenzo Garbieri, The Proclamation of the Barnabites’ Rule, 1611, San
Paolo Maggiore, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Figure 24. Guido Reni, Pietà dei Mendicanti (detail), 1613/16, Pinacoteca Nazionale,
Bologna (St. Proculus) (Photo: © Author).
Figure 25. Agostino Carracci, Last Communion of St. Jerome, 1591/2, Pinacoteca
Nazionale, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Figure 26. Agostino Carracci, Last Communion of St. Jerome (detail), 1591/2,
Figure 27. Agostino Carracci, Last Communion of St. Jerome (detail), 1591/2,
Figure 28. Annibale Carracci, Crucifixion with Saints Bernard di Siena, Francis,
Petronius, John and Mourners, 1583, Santa Maria della Carità, Bologna
(Photo: © Author).
Figure 29. Annibale Carracci, Baptism of Christ, 1585, Santi Gregorio e Siro, Bologna
Baldassarri).
Figure 30. Pontormo, Deposition, 1525/8, Cappella Capponi, Santa Felicita, Florence
(Photo: Alinari, Fratelli).
Figure 31. Annibale Carracci, Butcher’s Shop, 1582/3, Christ Church, Oxford (Photo:
By permission of the Governing Body of Christ Church, Oxford).
Figure 32. Guido Reni, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, c. 1630, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los
Angeles (Photo: © Author).
Figure 33. Guercino, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, 1649, National Gallery of Art,
Washington. (Photo: Patrons’ Permanent Fund Accession No.1986.17.2).
Figure 34. Carlo Cignani, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, c. 1670/80, Gemäldegalerie
Alte Meister, Dresden (Photo © bpk-Bildagentur).
Figure 35. Johann Zoffany, The Tribuna of the Uffizi, 1772/8, Royal Collection,
Windsor Castle (Photo: Royal Collection Trust / © Her Majesty Queen
Elizabeth II 2018).
Figure 36. Eustache Le Sueur, Descent from the Cross, 1651, Louvre, Paris (Photo: ©
RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / Gérard Blot).
Figure 37. Paul Delaroche, Hémicycle des Beaux-arts, 1837/41, École des Beaux-Arts,
Paris (Photo: © Beaux-Arts de Paris, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / image
Beaux-arts de Paris).
Figure 38. Guercino, Elijah Fed by Ravens, 1620, The National Gallery, London
(Photo: © The National Gallery, London).
Figure 39. Guercino, St. Francis, 1645, San Giovanni in Monte, Bologna (Photo: ©
Archivio Fotografico del Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Villani).
Figure 40. Annibale Carracci, Assumption of the Virgin, 1600/1, Cappella Cerasi,
Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome (Photo: © José Luiz Bernardes Ribeiro /
via Wikimedia Commons).
Figure 41. Caravaggio, Crucifixion of St. Peter, 1604, Cappella Cerasi, Santa Maria del
Popolo, Rome (Photo: After Sybille Ebert-Shifferer, Caravaggio: The Artist
and His Work, Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012).
Figure 42. Caravaggio, Conversion of St. Paul, 1604, Cappella Cerasi, Santa Maria del
Popolo, Rome (Photo: After Sybille Ebert-Shifferer, Caravaggio: The Artist
and His Work, Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012).
Figure 43. Cappella Cerasi, Santa Maria del Popolo, pyramidal structure.
Figure 44. Caravaggio, Conversion of St. Paul, 1600/1, Odescalchi Collection, Rome
(Photo: After Sybille Ebert-Shifferer, Caravaggio: The Artist and His Work,
Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012).
Preface
The intriguing stylistic diversity of Bolognese painting had a tremendous impact on

the development of artistic creation in seventeenth-century Italy. The flourishing
of different stylistic approaches in the Mannerist paintings of the previous gener-
ation evolved, in the work of the three Carracci and their Bolognese followers, into
an eclectic approach characterized by the combination of two or more styles in a
single work of art. These painters each sought to formulate an individual approach
characterized by more than one signature style, which they combined in accordance
with what they were asked to portray, in order to convey specific ideas or messages.
This study aims to redefine and re-evaluate Bolognese painting in the late six-
teenth and early seventeenth centuries in relation to the concept of eclecticism.
From the early nineteenth century until quite recently, this concept was perceived
as a synonym for bad art. A new appreciation of eclecticism emerged only in the last
few decades, in postmodern theory and writing—most notably in the work of Robert
Venturi and Denise Scott Brown, who blazed the way for a rehabilitation of this term
and of its aesthetic value. As I will argue in this book, by re-establishing the viability
of the term, one gains a new understanding of the unique nature of early modern
Bolognese painting, which expanded the limits of artistic creation and challenged
the constraints evident in Vasarian unity. Significantly, eclecticism also challenges
the traditional perception of linear stylistic development in the course of a given
painter’s artistic evolution. It is this study’s aim to show that by accepting diversity
as a major component of artistic theory and practice, one may uncover new layers of
meaning in Bolognese painting at the turn of the seventeenth century.
When I first began my research on artistic theory as embedded in seven-
teenth-century painting more than a decade ago, I was under the impression that
modern scholars overestimated the role of theory in the artistic production of this
period. My point of departure at that time was Donald Posner’s perception of the
Carracci’s practicality, together with Denis Mahon’s opinion on their experimental-
ism. Yet as my research evolved, I came to realize the importance of theory in seven-
teenth-century Bolognese artistic conduct. An understanding of the art of Ludovico
Carracci, Annibale Carracci, Guido Reni, and Guercino—the main protagonists of
this study—cannot be complete without an examination of the ideological sources
and theoretical precedents underlying their diverse practices.
My first encounter with a description that considers stylistic diversity, or eclecti-
cism, took place when I stumbled on Malvasia’s description of the St. George altar-
Unger, Daniel M., Redefining Eclecticism in Early Modern Bolognese Painting: Ideology, Practice, and Criticism,
Amsterdam University Press, 2019
doi: 10.5117/9789462986015/pre
piece in Santi Gregorio e Siro. Standing in front of the painting in Bologna, it took me
a while to acknowledge what the seventeenth-century biographer of the city’s paint-
ers actually meant. It was only after reading Malvasia’s account that I realized this
artwork’s key importance for understanding the Carracci’s reform. Malvasia’s subtle
stylistic differentiations between ‘the saint, the maiden, and the angels in the upper
section’, were an outcome of a distinct visual experience that differs greatly from that
of twenty-first century viewers. As will become evident in the following chapters,
his meticulous observations and perceptive eye shed light on details that are lost on
contemporary eyes overwhelmed by an endless flood of visual stimuli.
During the extended period that I spent gathering materials and formulating
my thoughts on this subject, I had the good fortune to share my insights with many
friends, colleagues, and students to whom I wish to express my deepest respect and
gratitude for their advice, experience, and knowledge. Some read the entire man-
uscript at different stages, adding to it as well as confronting and challenging me,
while always remaining supportive and enthusiastic. I am especially indebted in this
regard to Nirit Ben-Aryeh Debby, Larry Silver, and Dror Wahrman, who deserve spe-
cial thanks for the critical comments that made this study into a better book. Special
acknowledgment is also due to Giles Knox, Alexander Nagel, and Merav Yerushalmi,
who listened and expanded my understanding of various issues, and to Gal Ventura,
who greatly expanded my knowledge of life, culture, and society in nineteenth-cen-
tury France.
As a faculty member in the arts department at Ben-Gurion University of the Ne-
gev, I have benefited from my smart and supportive colleagues who contributed to
this project throughout its evolution by discussing my material or reading different
drafts of it. I am especially grateful to Nea Ehrlich, Haim Finkelstein, Ronit Milano,
and Sara Offenberg. My heartfelt thanks also go to my students, and especially to Es-
thy Kravitz Lurie, who assisted me in this project. They did not allow themselves to be
easily convinced by my arguments, and I am grateful for their thought-provoking in-
put. I would also like to thank Roni Amir, William Barcham, Rebecca Bossi, Michelle
Facos, Emma Gashinsky, Grace Harpster, Jonathon Hunt, Katrin Kogman-Appel, Or-
nat Lev-Er, Consuelo Lollobrigida, Haim Maor, Emilio Negro, Sheryl Reiss, Nicosetta
Roio, Rachel Sarfati, Camille Serchuk, Roni Taharlev, Nicholas Terpstra, and the many
other colleagues whom I met at various conferences, and who shared their thoughts
on this topic. It is a privilege to have been able to profit from the contributions of so
many insightful minds.
Special thanks are due to Erika Gaffney, my editor at AUP, and to Allison Levy, the
series editor, who both encouraged me to finally write the book and who made its
realization possible. Talya Halkin, my English editor, deserves special acknowledg-
ment not only from me, but also from the book’s future readers, for contributing to
its coherence and clarity.
Preface 15
This book is dedicated to Dina, my companion in life who encouraged me more

than anyone did to bring this project to fruition, and provided me with endless love,
support, and courage while we were both rather busy with our Noga, Or, Leigh, Gal,
and Alma. Finally, this list of acknowledgments would not be complete without
mentioning my parents, Evelyne and Aryeh (Leon) Unger, who are my most loyal and
erudite readers.
Daniel M. Unger, Jerusalem, 2018

Introduction
In a revealing passage regarding Ludovico Carracci’s St. Michael and St. George altar-
piece in the church of Santi Gregorio e Siro in Bologna (Plate 1), Count Carlo Cesare
Malvasia describes the painting in the following words:
Ludovico had a marvelous and unique ability to re-create the manner of whatever
master he chose to imitate, and because he practiced so many styles, one some-
times despairs of being able to identify a work as being by his hand. To view the
Saint George altarpiece in the church of San Gregorio, and to consider the three
styles, each one so different from the other, seen in the saint, the maiden, and the
angels in the upper section, is enough to drive one crazy.1
In this short passage, Malvasia, the seventeenth-century biographer of the Bolognese

school of painting, demonstrates his enthusiasm toward one of Ludovico’s Bolognese
altarpieces by emphasizing the painter’s skills as a master of stylistic variety. Carracci,
as his biographer tells us, possessed an ability to create a single work of art that com-
bined three different styles. According to Malvasia, this stylistic diversity is discernible
in the two main protagonists in the lower section of the altarpiece, the maiden and the
saint, as well as in the three distinct yet combined compositions in the upper section.
Count Carlo Cesare Malvasia (1616–1693), a native of Bologna and the scion of a
respectable local family, wrote what is still acknowledged today as the most compre-
hensive and detailed account of the development of painting in Bologna between
the fourteenth and seventeenth centuries. At first glance, his description may seem
surprising to contemporary twenty-first-century viewers accustomed to an ongoing
flood of media images. Such viewers might pass through the chapel without noticing
anything special about it, and might find it difficult to detect the subtle stylistic vari-
ations noted by Malvasia. Yet attention to these variations, which Malvasia described
as mind-blowing to the point of driving him mad (impazzire), provides a glimpse into
1 ‘Di qual maestro si è posto in testa di contrafar la maniera, mirabilmente l’ha fatto, ed in guisa, che in lui
solo vedendosene tante, si dispera talvolta di potervisi ben riconoscere la sua, ed assicurarsene: Il considerarsi
nel S. Giorgio nella Chiesa di S. Gregorio tre maniere tanto diverse, nel Santo, nella Donzella, e ne gli Angeli
nella parte superiore, e che sì ben accordano insieme, è cosa che fà impazzire.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I,
p. 484. For the English translation, see Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, p. 292. In the context of
modern scholarship, Keith Christiansen wrote: ʽSo varied is Ludovico’s work that at times he seems almost to
be several artists.’ See Christiansen, ‘A Late Masterpiece by Ludovico Carracci’, p. 22.
doi: 10.5117/9789462986015/intro
18 Redefining Eclecticism in Early Modern Bolognese Painting
seventeenth-century sensibilities that may shed new light on the visual experience of
Malvasia’s contemporaries. The relative dearth of images in the seventeenth century
may have been one of the reasons that seventeenth-century art lovers were meticu-
lous in their observations, as made evident in the passage by Malvasia.
In considering the subject of exposure to images and the relatively small number
of artworks in early modern Bologna, it is interesting to note a comment made by
Cardinal Gabriele Paleotti, first Bishop (1566–1582) and then Archbishop (1582–1586)
of Bologna, almost one hundred years before Malvasia’s time.2 In order to be of ser-
vice to the reformed Catholic Church, Paleotti devoted himself to instructing artists
about what was suitable for the portrayal of religious themes and about what kinds
of mistakes should be avoided. He argued that the popes who followed Gregory I all
advocated for the use of sacred images. A church, he continued, should not resemble
a synagogue or a mosque, where there are no images at all, nor should it resemble
a bare-walled room in a private home.3 This last point by Paleotti underscores the
scarcity of images in early modern experience.
Ludovico Carracci’s St. Michael and St. George altarpiece, in which Malvasia was
amazed to discern no less than three different styles, is a good example of the type
of eclectic paintings explored in this book. Commissioned by Cristoforo and Paride
Grimaldi in 1595, this complex painting consists of four utterly different groups of
figures positioned against a Titianseque landscape, whose illumination makes it
difficult to determine whether the episode is taking place at dawn or at dusk.4 This
ambiguity echoes the indeterminate character of the entire composition, which
depicts an unrealistic event: St. George, who appears on the left, presents the viewer
with his accomplishment—the slaying of a mighty dragon, positioned across from
him with a broken spear slashing its head. Just above the dragon, to the right, the
painter depicted a female figure looking down toward the dragon as she flees.
In this lower section, which demarcates the terrestrial realm, a single unified
moment represents the successful elimination of the Antichrist in the form of a
dragon. Yet the upper section, which captures the celestial realm, consists of three
consecutive scenes. The archangel Michael is seen banishing the rebellious angels
from Heaven (Apoc. 12:7–9). At the centre of the composition, the Archangel is seen
combating the representatives of Lucifer in the form of a dragon. This combat scene
is flanked by two other scenes in which St. Michael is fighting the revolting angels,
who appear in the form of human figures.5 The scene at the centre of the upper
2 Carofano, Negro and Roio, Il Compendio della Nobelissima città di Bologna di Giuseppe Rosaccio, p. 92. For
Paleotti’s position as Bishop of Bologna, see Prodi, Il Cardinale Gabriele Paleotti, I, p. 230. For the elevation of
Bologna to the status of an archdiocese in 1582, see Prodi, Il Cardinale Gabriele Paleotti, II, p. 434.
3 Paleotti, Discorso, p. 85. For the English translations, see Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 126.
4 Paolo Masini, Bologna Perlustrata, p. 131. For the commission, see Fanti, La chiesa dei Santi Gregorio e Siro
in Bologna, p. 284.
5 For the scene portrayed, see Gandellini, Notizie istoriche degl’ intagliatori, p. 319.
Introduction 19
section corresponds to that of St. George’s slashed dragon, thus drawing a parallel
between the celestial narrative and the terrestrial one. The upper section elaborates
and anticipates the lower part (or vice versa), showing the fierce combat between the
representatives of good and evil, or of virtue and vice.6 The battle concludes with the
triumph of the archangel above and of St. George below.
In the upper section, Ludovico used a brighter scale of colours than those applied
in the dark lower section. The figure of the Archangel is classically oriented, with
a scaled diffusion of light and a smooth, rounded body that stands out in contrast
to the sharp chiaroscuro employed in the depiction of St. George. The saint is also
depicted differently than the maiden, on a larger scale, so that he looms larger than
his counterpart. Additionally, the dark figure of the saint stands out in contrast to the
bright colours and diffuse light that characterize the maiden. The stylistic difference
between the two terrestrial figures is evident, for example, in the rendering of their
eyes. While those of St. George are almost invisible due to their dark contours, the
right eye of the maiden is clearly visible. This contrast is further underscored by the
drapery of both figures, with the coarse, patchy, colouristic style used for the saint’s
clothing differing from the delicate linear drapery of the maiden.
Earlier in his account of Ludovico, Malvasia expressed his opinion that the female
figure was rendered in a manner superior to what Raphael could have achieved:
Take for example the Saint George in the church of S. Gregorio, where on one side,
the principal figure of the holy knight is presented in such an exaggerated swaying
pose with the body’s weight thrown on one hip that it almost goes beyond the
bounds of a rational representation, while on the other side, the royal maiden, real-
izing with both fear and joy that her life has been restored to her through the death
of the horrible dragon, is so modest in pose, so correct and appropriate in outline
that Raphael himself could not have devised a more perfect and appealing figure.7
In this comparison, Malvasia is obviously conveying a highly personal view, yet

his observation also pertains to Ludovico’s mode of representation and attention
to movement. St. George is rendered unnatural ‘beyond the bounds of a rational
representation’, while the maiden is serene, realistically depicted, and modest. St.
6 For this dichotomy and for a discussion of the dragon as a Christian symbol of negative forces in the
Renaissance, see Didi-Huberman, Saint George et le Dragon, pp. 47–48; Maré, ‘There is no Hero Without a
Dragon’, pp. 196–198; Khalifa-Gueta, ‘Leonardo’s Dragons’, pp. 112–116.
7 ‘Per un di essi prendasi il S. Giorgio nella Chiesa di S. Gregorio, ove, come da una parte la principal figura,
ch’è il Santo Cavaliere, sfiancheggia, e s’altera in modo, che sta per uscir suore del ragionevole, dall’altra la
Real donzelletta, che lieta insieme, e timorosa contempla nella morte dell’orribil drago la riavuta sua vita, è
di profili così modesti, corretti ed aggiustati, che la più perfetta, ed amorosa figura mai sovvenne all’istesso
Rafaello.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 435. For the English translation, see Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the
Carracci, p. 211.
George’s pose is full of vigour, while the maiden appears rather frozen, with only mild
movement.
Malvasia’s two comments reveal a form of perception that is at the core of this
study. His first comment acknowledges that the altarpiece combines three different
styles, while the second details what, from his perspective, constituted the distinc-
tion among these styles. These subtle observations concerning Ludovico’s painting
and its ‘assemblageʼ (componimento) of styles reveal a sensibility towards a seven-
teenth-century phenomenon that has yet to be explicitly articulated, and which I
would like to define as ‘non-assimilated eclecticism’: the intentional combination of
different, consolidated styles in a single work of art. This type of eclecticism stands
out in contrast to the more common form of assimilated eclecticism discernible, for
example, in Vasari’s description of Raphael’s painting, in which different styles were
studied and assimilated into a single homogenous style. This study focuses on the
ideology, practice, and criticism of the non-assimilated eclecticism. It is concerned
with a configuration of artistic style and meaning that was specific to Bolognese
painting, and which developed at the end of the sixteenth century in the work of the
Carracci and their followers.
It was Johann Joachim Winckelmann, in the second half of the eighteenth cen-
tury, who first coined the term eclecticism in an artistic context, ascribing it to the
Bolognese school of painting. Subsequently, this term had a tremendous impact on
the reception of seventeenth-century Italian painting, influencing the development
of scholarship on the Italian art of this period. The current study also explores the
impact of this concept and its perception on shifting attitudes toward the Bolognese
school of painting in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The concept of eclec-
ticism stood at the core of modern scholarship concerning the Bolognese school of
painting from the time that it was first applied to the Carracci by Winckelmann up
until its rejection by Sir Denis Mahon almost two hundred years later, in 1947. The
dramatic vacillation between the acceptance and rejection of the Carracci and of the
painters considered to be their followers was, as this study will show, closely connect-
ed to changing attitudes toward eclecticism.
In examining late sixteenth and seventeenth-century eclecticism, I will thus focus
not only on the considerations that motivated painters during this period to use sev-
eral different styles within a single work of art, but also on the evolution of the term
‘eclecticism’ from a neutral definition to a pejoratively interpreted one, which caused
scholars and admirers of the Bolognese school of painting to dismiss it altogether in
order to restore the status of Bolognese seventeenth-century painting. Bolognese art
was thus rehabilitated at the cost of losing important layers of meaning, which were
abandoned in this process.
The aim of this book is to re-examine and redefine this particular type of non-as-
similated eclecticism in early modern Italian painting, to assess its ideological pur-
pose, and to elaborate on its usage as an iconographical tool. I propose that we address
Introduction 21
this concept neither as the name of an entire school of painting nor as an inferior
stylistic model or method. What began at the end of the sixteenth century as a practi-
cal religious need at the time of the Catholic Reform (which called for distinguishing
between the celestial and the terrestrial realms and between virtue and vice) evolved
into a unique feature of Bolognese painting. The painterly display of distinct forms of
stylistic virtuosity was thus used as an expressive vehicle for delivering ideas.
The use of more than one style in a single work of art as practiced by Ludovico
and Annibale Carracci, as well as by other important seventeenth-century Bolognese
painters such as Guido Reni and Giovanni Francesco Barbieri (better known as Guer-
cino), was directly related to Gabriele Paleotti and to his famous 1582 Discorso intorno
alle imagini sacre et profane. In this book on religious painting, Paleotti distinguished
between the representation of nature and the representation of a truthful matter or
idea that has no resonance in nature (such as dragons, angels, or hell). He used two
distinct terms, vero and verosimile, which were both borrowed from Aristotle. The
first term relates to nature and acknowledges its actuality, while the second relates
to what is true while remaining an imitation or a heightened illusion of what is real.
Soon after the book was first published, this ideological distinction was translated
by the painters of his diocese into a combination of styles that each retained their
unique features. What was considered true but not real, such as the celestial realm
and angels, was to be represented differently from what was considered real, such
as the terrestrial realm and its human inhabitants. It was this stylistic diversity that
resulted in non-assimilated eclecticism.8
Stylistic diversity, or the intentional non-assimilation of styles, was also acknowl-
edged by other seventeenth-century men of letters in addition to Malvasia, as well as
by important patrons. Indeed, the entire chain of artistic creation and reception as
found in seventeenth-century artistic practice and discourse adhered to the concept
of eclecticism.
Eclecticism came to be considered as a merely stylistic device. It was defined,
praised, and subsequently condemned and dismissed without a full and thorough
examination of what it might signify. It is quite clear that modern scholarship pre-
ferred not to address the issue of eclecticism and its application in seventeenth-cen-
tury painting, due to the negative connotation that the term had acquired. Its
deprecation has prevented a straightforward examination and appreciation of the
significance of eclecticism in Bolognese painting. This pejorative understanding
and ambivalence are clearly expressed by Rudolph Wittkower (1965) and Christine
Bolus-Reichert (2009). As Wittkower writes:
8 With respect to Caravaggio’s style, Dempsey distinguished between two aspects of his representation
of reality. Caravaggio’s real revolution, according to Dempsey, lay in his claim for expressing only what is
real (vero). Dempsey interpreted Caravaggio’s work as a form of subjective realism—that is, as an attempt to
represent his protagonists according to what he himself experienced and saw. Dempsey, ‘Caravaggio and the
Two Naturalist Styles’, pp. 92–94.
In keeping with this [the acceptance of selective borrowing as central to artistic

creativity by the majority of artists since the Renaissance] undeniable fact, the
most common empirical procedure of art historians is concerned with tracing of
influences and borrowings, and to that extent the method of selective borrowing
is silently acknowledged as perfectly respectable. But when confronted with this
very issue as an explicit theory, the same art historians paradoxically retract and
stigmatize it as eclectic.9
According to Wittkower, we might either admire or excoriate the same works,

depending on whether we interpret them as based on the traditional artistic meth-
ods of influence and imitation, or view them as based on a preconceived theory.
A more recent approach is represented by Christine Bolus-Reichert. While her
main focus is nineteenth-century eclecticism in English literature, she devotes a
chapter to the Carracci. As Bolus-Reichert writes,
Defending eclecticism is notoriously difficult since there is no particular visual or

literary style associated with it. Embracing eclecticism as a theory could destroy a
reputation, since romantic art history turned the classical theory of selective imi-
tation upside down. But practicing eclecticism has been unavoidable for writers,
philosophers, and artists alike at least since the end of the eighteenth century.10
Despite the differences in their approaches, both scholars point to the difficulty of
assessing the value of eclecticism and of defining this term, and both relate to its
negative reputation and especially to the revolving methodological and theoretical
attitudes towards the concept as both an artistic method and a theory.
With regard to Bolognese painting, Charles Dempsey suggests replacing the
term eclecticism with a different one, and proposes the well-established concept of
‘selected imitation’. As discussed by Wittkower, this idea has pertained since ancient
times not only to the process of artistic creation, but also to the viewer’s satisfac-
tion in perceiving such works of art.11 Dempsey describes Annibale as experiment-
ing with different artistic languages, consolidating his own style while exercising his
judgment to assemble artistic elements both from nature and from earlier works. In
9 Wittkower, ‘Imitation, Eclecticism, and Genius’, p. 154.

10 Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 25. In her book, Bolus-Reichert explained Victorian eclecticism
as it emerged in the nineteenth century in Britain and France. According to her, although the term had a
negative implication throughout the century, it also had an important impact on the development of literary
writing. In defining the term, the author refers to the Bolognese painters of the seventeenth century and
especially the reception of the Carracci during the nineteenth century, and to the debate that took place in
the mid-twentieth century. The approach toward the Carracci underlined the term. Eclecticism, according to
Bolus-Reichert, was a central phenomenon for understanding the Victorian age, which she would further call
the age of eclecticism.
11 Wittkower, ‘Imitation, Eclecticism, and Genius’, pp. 144–145.
Introduction 23
other words, Dempsey implies that Annibale was picking and choosing. He associ-
ates the Carracci’s work with a theoretical model, according to which the artist used
his own preconceived idea in order to decide what he should take from nature and
what he should take from artists of previous generations, for the sake of producing
the most perfect painting.12 In doing so, the artist distilled the essence from different
regional artistic languages for the purpose of creating a coherent and unified artistic
language. ‘It appears to me’, Dempsey writes
that discussion of the question of imitation, under the misnomer of eclecticism,

and the art of the Carracci has been greatly confused by failing to distinguish
between the various necessary activities of an artist, especially as these were con-
ceived by the Carracci themselves. On the one hand, it was the artist’s job to imitate
natural and artificial perfections, and then to observe their nature and principles,
anatomizing art even as he anatomized and classified nature. On the other hand,
it was also the artist’s job to reassemble these things according to his own idea,
regulated by judgment which had been freed by the attainment of perfection in
imitation (Practice) and in observation (Theory).13
In the above-quoted passage, Dempsey acknowledges the connection between prac-

tice and theory that is most important for understanding Bolognese painting. His
idea of selective or judicious imitation belongs to the vocabulary of eclecticism that
emphasizes the stage of learning, absorbing, and even appropriating the styles of
previous generations. It is this process of absorption that enabled painters to create
the stylistic distinctions at the core of this study. From this perspective, the use of
the concept ‘imitation’ is redundant. A painter does not have to imitate, emulate,
borrow, or even be inspired by another artist in order to practice eclecticism, once he
has developed a variety of styles. Imitation, in the context of non-assimilated eclec-
ticism, should be referred to only in its most basic sense, as described by Paleotti:
Painting is an imitative art, as everyone knows, and he paints well who imitates
well; nor does anyone imitate well who does not imitate things as they were, or as
it is reasonable that they were, especially when it comes to the status of persons
because, of all the things that can be imitated, that is the most important.14
12 See also Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, p. li.

13 Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 60–70. For the quote, see Dempsey,
Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, p. 60.
14 ‘Imperò che la pittura come ogn’uno sa, è arte imitatrice, & quello dipinge bene che ben imita: ne mai
imita bene, chi non imita le cose, o come furono, o come è ragionevole che fossero, massimamente quanto alla
conditione della persona, che è la principale tra tutte le cose, che si possono imitare.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 184;
Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 228.
According to this passage, true art is based on reality. Paleotti judged painting accord-
ing to the similarity between an object, or a person, and its depiction. The greater the
similarity, the better the painting.
The ongoing dismissal of eclecticism as a definitive term in the context of Bolog-
nese artistic creation builds on the fact that one cannot find a single instance in which
the term was used in an artistic context prior to the eighteenth century. The term was
regarded as a mere anachronism. The explicit absence of the word ‘eclectic’ in the
seventeenth-century discourse on painting merits some clarification. During the ear-
ly modern period, many terms were coined only after the emergence of a phenom-
enon. Maria H. Loh, for instance, relates to the well-known term ‘originality’, which,
like eclecticism, is also an eighteenth-century invention. According to Loh, the term
used to express originality in previous generations was inventione.15 Paolo Pino, the
Venetian art theorist, author, and painter, wrote that a painter used this device to
interpret ‘poems and histories on one’s own’, and to create his own translation of a
scene. Pino’s Fabio says in this context, ‘Happy is he who does not steal another’s
labors!’16 One should also mention Carlo Ginzburg’s description of Mancini’s Con-
siderazioni as the first book of connoisseurship, which he calls the ‘first attempt to
establish connoisseurship, as it was to be called a century later’. Connoisseurship,
according to Ginzburg, existed before the term was coined.17 In a similar vein, Moshe
Barasch attributed the craft of connoisseurship to Filippo Baldinucci, who attempted
to distinguish between different ‘hands’ and to catalogue the drawings of individu-
al painters. According to Barasch, Baldinucci’s work preceded both the terminology
and its theoretical articulation, which was first expressed in 1699 by Roger de Piles in
his Idea of the Perfect Painting.18 One example of a more general concept is the term
‘Sociology’, which was coined by Auguste Comte in the nineteenth century yet refers
to a phenomenon that long preceded this definition.19 The abundance of such cases
should serve to reject any attempt to dismiss modern terms such as eclecticism as
merely anachronistic.
When early modern eclecticism did receive attention in the second half of the
twentieth century, it remained coloured by the problematic connotations and defini-
tions of the previous century, and was associated with a restricted set of stylistic and
theoretical precepts ascribed to the Carracci. In this respect, one should mention
two examples that may shed light on the range of ways in which eclecticism was
perceived in modern scholarship. In his 1988 book Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, Carl
15 Loh, ‘New and Improved’, p. 477.

16 ‘felice colui, che nŏ fuara l’altrvi fatiche.’ See Pino, Dialogo di pittura, p. 16; Pardo, ‘Paolo Pino’s “Dialogo di
Pittura”’, p. 334.
17 Ginzburg, ‘Morelli, Freud and Sherlock Holmes’, p. 17. See also Sohm, Style in the Art Theory of Early
Modern Italy, p. 227, n. 68; Frigo, ‘Can One Speak of Painting if One Cannot Hold a Brush? p. 419; Gage, Painting
as Medicine in Early Modern Rome, p. 21.
18 Barasch, Modern Theories of Art 1, pp. 47–48.
19 See Brooks III, The Eclectic Legacy, p. 19.
Introduction 25
Goldstein discusses the Carracci painters in relation to seventeenth-century artistic

discourse. Although he does not explicitly address the concept of eclecticism, Gold-
stein’s engagement with the complexity of their work touches upon this subject. He
relates, on the one hand, to what modern scholars claim as proof of Annibale’s intel-
lectualism and imitation of nature (Dempsey’s combination of practice and theory).
Annibale’s interest in theoretical matters is manifested, for example, in his notes on
the margins of Vasari’s Vite (the postille). In one place Annibale remarked that ‘Vasari
did not realize that the great artists of Antiquity derived their works from nature,
and advises that artists simply study antique works, and not nature, which is a mis-
conception, for nature must always be imitated’. At the same time, Goldstein focuses
on a quote by Mancini, who described Annibale as ‘a universal painter, of the sacred
and the profane, the light-hearted and serious, a true painter because he was able to
work, “di sua fantasia” without having a model in front of him’.20 Although the eclec-
tic potential of this duality is not developed in Goldstein’s book, he does point to a
method that involved both those aspects mentioned in the postille and the qualities
mentioned by Mancini. As Goldstein describes them, the Carracci based themselves
on an investigation of nature, the study of the antique, ‘and pursuit of an ideal of the
kind identified in the theory of Agucchi and Bellori’.21
Later in his book, Goldstein explains the process of imitation discernible in the
Carracci paintings, again without explicitly mentioning the term ‘eclecticism’:
The process of selection with which the Carracci have been associated involves
far more, however, than the occasional—or frequent—copying of works by other
artists. It involves, first, isolating a particular element or quality located in the work
of one artist and, second, combining it with another from the work of a different
artist.22
This description calls to mind the sixteenth-century methods described by writers

such as Giovanni Paolo Lomazzo and Giovanni Battista Armenini (to be discussed
below).
In her 1993 monograph on Ludovico Carracci, Gail Feigenbaum writes about
Annibale’s eclectic methodology as characteristic of the Carracci Academy, noting
that he ‘immersed himself in Correggio in the Pietà, in Barocci in the Baptism, and
then in an investigation of Titian by rapid turns in other works in the course of the
same years’. According to Feigenbaum, each painting was done in a different manner.
20 Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, pp. 34–35.

21 Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, p. 37.
22 Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, pp. 177–178. For the eclecticism that Goldstein is referring to, see
also Gash, ‘Hannibal Carrats’, p. 244. For the Feigenbaum reference, see Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, p. lii.
A deeper inquiry into the terms used in early modern discourse in relation to
eclecticism has been undertaken by Maria H. Loh, who revitalizes eclecticism and
accepts it as a doctrine practiced by seicento painters. In 2004, she maintained that
although the word itself did not exist, the idea of eclecticism was described verbally
by such terms as ‘mixtureʼ (misto), ‘tasteʼ (gusto), and ‘pasticheʼ (pasticcio).23 With
regard to the term ‘mixtureʼ, Loh writes: ‘Misto, therefore, articulated a model of rep-
etition based on judicious selection or eclecticism.’
Loh’s findings raise the following question: Could there be a reason beyond that
of stylistic preference for the combination of several distinct styles in a single work
of art? Part of the answer to this question, as I would like to show, is to be found in
Paleotti’s discourse, which distinguishes between the representation of nature and
the representation of a truthful matter or idea that has no resonance in nature. A
second, related question is: What could have motivated the generators of eclecticism
to practice it? The answer to this question is to be found both in the works of art
themselves and in Malvasia’s writings, as evident in the above-quoted statements
from his Felsina Pittrice, where he identified Ludovico’s ability to create a single work
of art that combined three different styles.
Eclecticism, according to Loh, was both an aesthetic and a moral principle. This
claim represents the first positive understanding of eclecticism in modern scholar-
ship (since Denis Mahon called to dismiss it altogether), as an idea or a doctrine
that existed in seventeenth-century artistic theory and practice. In this regard, Loh’s
reception of eclecticism is a valuable new voice, albeit a lone one. In other recent
works of scholarship, eclecticism continues to be considered ‘a dead issue’, to cite
Dempsey’s 1977 verdict.24 In a 2005 catalogue that centred on Annibale’s Venus,
Adonis and Cupid, curator Andrés Úbeda de los Cobos stated that: ‘Today the accu-
sation of “eclecticism” that once overshadowed the reputation of Annibale Carracci
(1560–1609) and the Bolognese school is recognized to be empty of substance.’25 It is
this claim that the current study seeks to reinvestigate.
Bolognese eclecticism has its own history—a history in need of telling for the
purpose of stripping away the prejudiced misconceptions that have attached
themselves to it. This concept was at the centre of the modern debate on artistic
quality, and constituted a fundamental concept in the art-historical writing of the
early modern period. It is this attribution that bundled ‘the Bolognese school of
painting’ painters including Annibale and Ludovico Carracci, Guido Reni, Dome
nichino, Francesco Albani, and Guercino, together with Alessandro Tiarini, Lorenzo
Garbieri, and Bartolomeo Schidone (who also came to be known as ‘the followers
23 Loh, ‘New and Improved’, p. 484.

24 Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, p. 54. See also Cropper, The Domenichino
Affair, pp. 103–104.
25 Úbeda de los Cobos, ‘Venus, Adonis and Cupid’, p. 19.
Introduction 27
of the Carracci’) under a single term as ‘the eclectic school of painting’, or simply,
‘the eclectics’.26
The use of more than one style in a single work of art, as found in the religious paint-
ings of the Bolognese school, was meant to form a separation, or a barrier, between
different realms—a demand first formulated by Paleotti. Yet not every painter in Bolo-
gna practiced this kind of non-assimilated combination of styles, and even those who
did were not consistent in doing so. Although eclecticism defines many works of reli-
gious art, one can point to many other paintings in which this method was not used.
In his important study on notions of style in early modern Italy, Philip Sohm elab-
orates on the complexity of what was regarded as a ‘style’. In its most basic sense,
a style is about appearance and about how a painter wanted his viewers to look
at a certain scene. At the same time, writes Sohm, it is a form of self-revelation or
self-fashioning.27 Modern conventions see stylistic evolution as a dynamic process
that painters are expected to go through in the course of their careers, as they learn
from their predecessors and are influenced by changing stylistic trends.28 At the same
time, a painter is also expected to develop more than one individual style of his own.
This developmental trajectory is conventionally attributed to twentieth-century
painters, such as Picasso, Kandinsky, Mondrian, and Kazimir Malevich, to mention
only a few. Yet is this a modern phenomenon, or does the same process apply equally
to the early modern period? Malvasia’s discussion of Reni, for instance, delineates
the progression of his ability to learn, study, absorb, and change styles not just as
a continuous linear, chronological evolution, but also as an adaptation of styles he
encountered in the course of his career. Reni, according to his biographer, acquired
his first manner under the guidance of Denys Calvaert. After visiting the Carracci
academy, he sought to emulate their stylistic achievements. According to Malvasia,
Ludovico offered him a way to change his style:
26 For the joint grouping of these artists, one should mention Joshua Reynolds, the great English painter
who in his Discourses of 1797 regarded these artists as coming ‘from the school of the Carraccis’. See
Reynolds, Discourses, p. 105. For the use of the term ‘eclectics’ to describe the Bolognese painters, see also
Kugler, Handbuch der Geschichte der Malerei, p. 332; Heywood, The Important Pictures of the Louvre, p. 147;
Friedlaender, ‘Some Carracci Studies’, p. 265; Blunt and Whinney, The Nation’s Pictures, p. 34 and p. 59.
27 Sohm, Style in the Art Theory of Early Modern Italy, pp. 6–15. For the notion of style as perceived in the
seventeenth century, see also Gombrich, ‘Style’, pp. 129–139; Sauerländer, ‘From Stilus to Style’, pp. 253–270;
Williams, Art, Theory, and Culture, pp. 73–108. Reynolds defined style in painting as equivalent to writing.
It is ‘a power over materials, whether words or colours, by which conceptions or sentiments are conveyed’.
Reynolds, Discourses, p. 32. See also Paul Barolsky’s article on the artist’s hand, in which he discerns the ability
of sixteenth-century painters to create a painting without disclosing their own style, as if the artist’s hands
were concealed in gloves. Barolsky mentioned Vasari’s story about the copy made by Andrea del Sarto of
Raphael’s famous portrait of Pope Leo X, and Giulio Romano’s astonishment at not being able to recognize
the forgery of his own hand. Romano admitted to assisting Raphael in creating the painting. See Barolsky, ‘The
Artist’s Hand’, p. 5 and p. 11.
28 Summers, ‘Conventions in the History of Art’, p. 107; Gombrich, ‘Style’, p. 132 and p. 135. See also Cropper,
The Domenichino Affair, pp. 104–105. For the intertwined perception of styles as a signature and as a language,
see Sauerländer, ‘From Stilus to Style’, pp. 255–258; Sohm, Style in the Art Theory of Early Modern Italy, pp. 67–72.
Although Guido had drunk of this [Calvaert] manner with the milk of his early
training, Ludovico went on to say, it would be easy to rid himself of it, since at his
tender age it was more food than nutriment and could easily be evacuated. The
purgative and emetic he, Ludovico, would administer to him rapidly through the
study and observation of a good natural manner […] Following this plan, Guido
began to give his works a certain Carraccesque ease and naturalness, and there are
no words to tell how Denys scorned them and how he ranted.29
Malvasia stresses Reni’s absorption of a second style. Later on in his account, he

focuses on Reni’s study of a third style, writing that a painting by Caravaggio reached
the Lambertini collection in Bologna, and that Ludovico Carracci was quite crit-
ical about its reliance on nature without modifications or judgment. Guido heard
Ludovico’s criticism, yet ‘set himself to the practice of this new manner. He refined
it with great study and had the advantage and good fortune of being the first inter-
preter of this new style’.30 Later on, while working in Rome for Cavalier d’Arpino, he
practiced his Caravaggesque manner while simultaneously producing paintings that
Caravaggio regarded as opposed to his own work:
This was the case with the Crucifixion of St. Peter for the church of the Tre Fontane,
outside of Rome. D’Arpino promised Cardinal Borghese that Guido would trans-
form himself into Caravaggio and would paint the picture in Caravaggio’s dark and
driven manner, and he did so skilfully, as we can see […] But if Guido’s presence
displeased Annibale, how much more was it displeasing to Caravaggio, who greatly
feared this new manner, which was completely the opposite of his and was equally
well received.31
29 ‘ma benche bevuta da lui col latte de’ primi ammaestramenti, facile però ad evacuarsi, per esser passata
più in cibo, che in alimento alla sua ancor fresca età: Il purgante, & il vomitorio, esser’ egli per ministrarglielo
con ogni prontezza sullo studio, & osservazione di un buon naturale […] Seguitando dunque colà Guido,
e cominciando a dare nell’ opre in un certo naturale, e facilità Carraccesca, non si può dire quanto se ne
sdegnasse, e quanti strilli ne desse Dionigi. Cancellargli con le deta il meglio, sgridandolo d’una maniera
così trascurata, e rozza, non punto dissimile a quella infingarda de’ Carracci, che mancavano d’ogni pulizia,
e finitezza.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 6. For the English translation, see Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni,
pp. 38–39.
30 ‘Se ne pose alla pratica, la raffinò col gran studio, ed ebbe il vanto di essere il primo, e fortunato introduttore
di questa nuova manìera.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 10. For the English translation, see Malvasia, The Life
of Guido Reni, p. 44. The painting by Caravaggio in the Lambertini collection was the Incredulity of St. Thomas.
See also Canato, Caravaggio e i caravaggeschi in Emilia, p. 121.
31 ‘come poi avvenne del S. Pietro Crocefisso alle trè Fontane fuor di Roma, promettendo egli al Card.
Borghese, che sarebbesi Guido trasformato nel Caravaggio, e l’avrebbe fatto di quella maniera cacciata e scura,
come bravamente eseguito si vede. […] Ma se non piacque ad Annibale, tanto più spiacque al Caravaggio,
che temette assai di una nuova maniera, totalmente alla sua opposta, ed altrettanto, quanto la sua gradita.’
Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 15. For the English translation, see Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni, p. 50. See also
Sohm, Style in the Art Theory of Early Modern Italy, p. 26.
Introduction 29
According to Malvasia, Reni’s use of different styles in the early seventeenth century
was criticized by both Annibale Carracci and Caravaggio, the most prominent paint-
ers working in Rome at that time.
The definition of non-assimilated eclecticism, however, involves a different type
of stylistic evolution—one that makes use of multiple styles simultaneously. The
acceptance of this term might thus provide us with a new understanding of the sty-
listic changes that we find in the development of different painters. For example,
if we consider Reni’s Caravaggesque phase as learning a new style that he thought
would be advantageous for him in the future, this concept might help us explain Car-
avaggesque elements in his late period. In exploring Guercino’s development, which
according to modern scholars, involved a shift from a naturalistic manner to a more
refined classical manner, we will similarly be able to explain why his late style is so
different from the early one by examining his study of the styles of Ludovico, Cara-
vaggio, Lanfranco, and Reni at different junctions in his career. Yet if we accept that
the different styles he developed had a purpose beyond that of mere change or deter-
ministic evolution, and that he used his different styles in accordance with Paleotti’s
demand to create thematic or conceptual distinctions, we gain an important new
tool for understanding the meaning of his paintings.
This study sets out to reconsider the validity of eclecticism in seventeenth-cen-
tury artistic practice, to evaluate its artistic qualities, and to explain its underlying
rationale. My analysis of early modern Bolognese paintings thus attends not only
to stylistic considerations, but also to iconographic ones, showing how the idea or
message of a given painting gains additional meaning once an eclectic approach is
noticeable. A second aim of this study is to elaborate on the history of the term over
the last 250 years, since it was first applied by Winckelmann in the eighteenth centu-
ry until its dismissal almost 200 years later.
Chapter One traces different attitudes toward eclecticism and its conceptualiza-
tion. As will be shown, Malvasia’s interpretation of Ludovico’s St. George altarpiece
was based on a longstanding understanding of stylistic divisions that is present in the
most famous early modern treatises that use different terms to address the concept
of eclecticism. Although the concept itself is not mentioned in seventeenth-century
artistic discourse, the ideas it defines are clearly articulated.
Chapter Two will explore the ideological context of non-assimilated eclecticism,
which is made evident in Paleotti’s book on religious painting. Both the writer and
the painters discussed in this book belonged to the same cultural sphere, which was
characterized by the resonance of very specific ideas. Paleotti’s attitude towards ico-
nography was given expression by means of stylistic tools. His separation between
modes of representation was transformed into a differentiation in terms of design,
colour, scale, composition, and movement. This chapter continues with an explora-
tion of Guido Reni’s visual elaboration on the dichotomy between disegno and colo-
re as a pictorial manifestation of non-assimilated eclecticism. Guido’s painting will
then be compared with Guercino’s more traditional conception of this same subject.
Finally, an examination of Malvasia’s biography of Ludovico Carracci will suggest
some additional concerns addressed through the use of several styles in a single work
of art.
Chapter Three is devoted to the implementation of eclecticism in artistic practice.
It opens with an analysis of how the celestial and the terrestrial realms are repre-
sented in different styles within the same composition. This analysis will be followed
by the examination of the differentiation between deferent types of saints—those
whose facial features are known, and those early saints who left no traces of their
likeness. This concern will be elaborated upon by attending closely to Reni’s portray-
al of the sixteenth-century St. Carlo Borromeo, in comparison to the portrayal of his-
torically earlier saints. The third part of this chapter will focus on other non-assimi-
lated eclectic paintings by this book’s four protagonists: Ludovico Carracci, Annibale
Carracci, Guido Reni, and Guercino.
Chapter Four will focus on the reception of the term ‘eclecticism’ in the eighteenth
century, when Winckelmann coined it, on its waning acceptance in the nineteenth
century, and on Denis Mahon’s call to dismiss the term from art-historical discourse
in order to do away with its negative and pejorative associations. This call was fully
accepted by twentieth-century scholars.
The Epilogue will address an example of non-assimilated eclecticism in a Roman
chapel, where a conscious attempt was made to integrate the works of two painters,
Annibale Carracci and Caravaggio, into a single set of decorative works in the Cerasi
Chapel. As this chapter will show, the combination of Annibale’s and Caravaggio’s
different styles served to elucidate the narrative and meaning of the entire chapel.
Both the theory and the practice of eclecticism are evident in Paleotti’s discourse,
Malvasia’s writings on the Bolognese painters, and, above all, in the actual works
of art themselves. Moreover, despite the scepticism concerning this term, eclecti-
cism is very much alive in the vast literature on Bolognese painting since Winckel-
mann, appearing consistently throughout the nineteenth century and up until the
mid-twentieth century. The term eclecticism relates to unique aspects of the works
created by the Bolognese painters, and distinguishes them from their predecessors.
In doing so, it emphasizes the variety, virtuosity, openness, and creativity that have
always been associated with the Carracci and their reform in painting.
This study aims to emphasize the importance of the non-assimilated type of
eclecticism in early modern Bologna and to elaborate on its uses. In doing so, it seeks
to rehabilitate the term in a manner that will allow us to cast a fresh gaze at the most
challenging reform of painting that took place at the turn of the seventeenth century
in Italy.
Although this book attends closely to art theory, it is neither about theories of aes-
thetics nor about what constitutes classical or academic art. Rather, it explores how
the Bolognese painters responded to a single concern addressed in Paleotti’s famous
Introduction 31
Discorso intorno alle imagini sacre et profane. This concern centred on distinguishing
between truth and nature—between what is believed to be true, especially in reli-
gious terms, and day-to-day reality and experience—and on the pictorial translation
of these distinctions by stylistic tools. In doing so, I will focus on Ludovico, Annibale,
Reni, and Guercino, whose religious works responded to Paleotti’s discourse.
1. Defining Eclecticism
Abstract
Chapter One traces different attitudes toward eclecticism and its conceptualization.
As will be shown, Malvasia’s interpretation of Ludovico’s St. George altarpiece was
based on a longstanding understanding of stylistic divisions that is present in the
most famous early modern treatises that use different terms to address the concept
of eclecticism. Although the concept itself is not mentioned in seventeenth-century
artistic discourse, the ideas it defines are clearly articulated. Indeed, one may identify
three types of eclecticism in both the practice and the discourse of early modern art:
assimilated eclecticism, arbitrary eclecticism, and non-assimilated eclecticism.
Keywords: Eclecticism, Ludovico Carracci, Sonetto in lode di Nicolò B

olognese,
Agostino Carracci, Lucio Faberio, Paolo Pino, Lomazzo
The concept of eclecticism is actually quite simple. Both the term and its practice
have a long history, which can be traced back to classical Greek philosophy. The
Greek verb eklegein or eklegesthai means ‘to choose’. In its broader sense, eclecti-
cism refers to picking and selecting different philosophical doctrines and combin-
ing them together—much like Seneca’s bees, which made nectar gathered from dif-
ferent flowers into honey.1 Paleotti referred to the bees that produced sweet honey
out of a variety of wildflowers, while also drawing an analogy to spiders, which, like
Seneca’s bees, gather wildflowers but use them to produce lethal poison rather than
honey.2 This type of dichotomy is characteristic of Paleotti’s method throughout
his discourse. The bee metaphor also found expression in Malvasia’s book Felsina
Pittrice, in which he considered Ludovico as ‘an ingenious bee that extracted the
sweet essences from all the flowers of paintings, not leaving even the gardens of the
Vatican untapped’.3
1 Morell, The Epistles of Lucius Annæus Seneca, II, epistle 84. For Seneca’s bee metaphor and its acceptance
in the Renaissance, see Hub, ‘Filarete’s Self-Portrait Medal’, pp. 52–54.
2 ‘Onde noi veggiamo che ancor del succo de fiori nati alla campagna, le api fanno soave mele, & le aragni
ne cavano mortifero veneno.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 38; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 84.
3 ‘ed insomma fù quell’ape ingegnosa, che da tutti i fiori di Pittura seppe cavar dolcezze, non la perdonando
a stessi giardini del Vaticano’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 491; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci,
p. 304. See also Gash, ‘Hannibal Carrats’, p. 245; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, pp. 74–76.
doi: 10.5117/9789462986015/ch01
Eclecticism, then, expresses a need to pick and choose. It may be associated with
a confused and casual combination of ideas, as perceived by the Greek physician and
philosopher Galen. However, it may also be regarded as a distinguished and careful
choice, as is evident in the writings of Diogenes Laertius, the biographer of the Greek
philosophers.4
In early modern discourse, eclecticism was regarded much as it was by the Greek
philosophers, as expressed in Michel de Montaigne’s Essays (1580).5 It is equally
evident in the writing of Justus Lipsius (Manductio ad stoicam philosophiam, 1604),
whom Paleotti considered inviting to the University of Bologna.6 These thinkers advo-
cated the freedom to pick and choose consciously from among various philosophi-
cal schools, and refused to follow any single master forging their own intellectual
path.7 This approach persisted into the nineteenth century, and is especially notable
in the work of the French philosopher Victor Cousin, who followed this same ancient
attitude in his Sorbonne lectures (delivered in 1817–1818, and published in 1853), in
which he called for an embrace of a wide variety of philosophical approaches for the
sake of studying and enriching philosophy.8
Eclecticism can also be detected in Agnolo Firenzuola’s Dialogo delle bellezze del-
le donne (1541). Basing himself on a long-standing tradition (going back to Zeuxis),
Firenzuola called writers to select the most beautiful parts from different women, for
the sake of creating the most perfect and beautiful female form. He suggested that ‘in
order to draw a woman who is, if not in everything at least for the most part, perfect,
it is necessary […] to take the best particular beautiful parts from all four […] and to
create from them a woman as beautiful as we wish’.9
Notable among other literary theorists of the early modern period who expressed
eclectic ideas or approaches are Girolamo Muzio and Torquato Tasso. James Hut-
son identified in both of these sixteenth-century men a need to conduct a thorough
and comprehensive study of earlier poetic endeavours, selecting the best stylistic
4 Diderot, ‘Eclectisme’, p. 273; Donini, ‘The History of the Concept of Eclecticism’, pp. 15–16; Kelley,
‘Eclecticism and the History of Ideas’, pp. 579–580. See also Glucker, ‘Cicero’s Philosophical Affiliations’,
pp. 35–36; Schneider, ‘Eclecticism Rediscovered’, pp. 174–176.
5 Montaigne’s eclectic approach is manifested, for example, in his unsystematized ideas and his choice of
list of themes in his Essais. See Taylor, ‘The Order of Persons’, p. 50.
6 Prodi mentioned this in his introduction to the translation of Paleotti’s Discorso. See Prodi, ‘Introduction’,
p. 30.
7 See Force, ‘Montaigne and the Coherence of Eclecticism’, p. 533; Kelley, ‘Eclecticism and the History of
Ideas’, pp. 581–582.
8 On Victor Cousin, see Brooks III, The Eclectic Legacy, pp. 36–56; Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, pp.
65–80. Cousin’s approach will be discussed in part three.
9 ‘in modo che à volerne disegnare una che sia se non in tutto, almeno nella maggior parte perfetta, egli è
necessario come vi si disse all’altro ragionamento, pigliar l’eclenza delle belleze delle particolari parti di tutta
quattro voi, & singerne una bella come noi disideriamo.’ Firenzuola, Dialogo, p. 31. For the English translation,
see Firenzuola, On the Beauty of Women, p. 45. For Firenzuola’s eclectic approach, see also Howard, ‘Carracci
School of Drawings in Sacramento’, p. 370. See also Sohm, ‘Gendered Style’, p. 765.
Defining Eclecticism 35
models among them in order to write an epic poem. As Muzio wrote in his 1551 Dell’
Arte poetica: ‘The epic poem is a picture / Of the Universe and contains in itself /
All styles, all forms, all likenesses.’10 Similarly, Tasso expressed the importance of
using different stylistic modes of writing. He stressed the need to include a variety of
writing styles within a single epic poem, with each style retaining its own features.11
As Secondo Lancellotti claimed in his L’Hoggidi overo il mondo non peggiore ne più
calamitoso del passato (1622): ‘There are many books in one book, and many authors
speak through the mouth of one author.’12 Tasso and Lancellotti seem to relate to
what Thomas Greene has identified as a type of imitation defined by Renaissance
rhetoricians as ‘a vast container whose contents can be disarranged endlessly with-
out suffering damage’.13
Firenzuola was followed by art theorists, such as Paolo Pino and Lodovico Dolce,
who wrote that art should surpass what is natural and who advocated for selecting
parts from different female figures in order to depict the perfect woman. For Pino, the
most beautiful woman in the world was Venus, while Dolce preferred Helen. Pino’s
painter, Fabio, tells Lauro that it is best to learn from Zeuxis, because the painter
elected from among all of the city’s young maidens five virgins whose beauty would
furnish the entirety of his Venus; whereupon he took from one of them the eyes,
from another the mouth and from yet another the breast, in this guise bringing his
work to its perfection.14
Dolce similarly mentioned Zeuxis and his selection:
Hence the precedent furnished for us by Zeuxis, who, called upon to do a painting
of Helen for the Temple of the Crotonians, chose to study five young girls in the
nude. And by supplying from one of these the beautiful parts that were missing
10 ‘Il poema sovrano è una pittura/ De l’universo: & però in se comprende/ Ogni stilo, ogni forma, ogni
ritratto.’ Muzio, Rime diverse del Mutio Iustinopolitano, p. 80. On Muzio’s Arte poetica, see Weinberg, A History
of Literary Criticism, II, pp. 729–731. See also Hutson, Early Modern Art Theory, p. 153.
11 ‘Lo stile del Lirico poi se bene non cosi magnifico come l’Heroico, molto più deve essere fiorito, & oranto,
la qual forma di dire fiorita, (come i Retorici affermano) è propria della mediocrità. […] Questa varietà di stili
deve essere usata, ma non si che si muti lo stile, non mutandosi le materie, che saria imperfettione grádissima.’
Tasso, Discorsi dell’arte poetica, p. 26.
12 ‘che in un libro sieno molti libri, e che la bocca d’un’ Autor parlino moltissimi Autori.’ Lancellotti, L’ Hoggidi
overo il mondo non peggiore ne più calamitoso del passato, n. p.; Loh, ‘New and Improved’, p. 477 and p. 483. For
more references of this kind, see Williams, Art, Theory, and Culture, pp. 76–77; Cast, The Delight of Art, p. 88.
13 Greene, The Light in Troy, p. 39.
14 Pardo, ‘Paolo Pino’s ‘Dialogo di Pittura’, p. 303. See also Wittkower, ‘Imitation, Eclecticism, and Genius’, p.
149. Another important reference is that by Maurice Poirier, who discussed in his article the complementary
connection between disegno and colore. See Poirier, ‘The Disegno-Colore Controversy Reconsidered’, p. 57.
Pino’s dictum is also repeated by Reynolds in his second discourse on art. See Reynolds, Discourses, p. 33.
in another, he brought his Helen to such a pitch of perfection that the fame of the
work still lives on.15
This same analogy is also used by Paleotti, who discusses Zeuxis in the second book
of his Discorso.16
Another seventeenth-century advocate of an eclectic approach was Francesco
Scannelli, the author of Microcosmo della pittura (1657). Yet rather than focusing
on different female figures, he believed that a painter should select among the best
features found in nature, thus replacing the pursuit of classical idealization with
naturalism. As already noted by Denis Mahon, Scannelli’s inclination was toward
naturalism.17
With respect to the Carracci, their early biographers emphasized (as noted by
Diane de Grazia) that they had a habit of continuously drawing from their own expe-
rience and life. The three Carracci painters even drew while eating, holding a slice of
bread in one hand and a pen in the other. (Nevertheless, it seems that the Carracci
had little regard for the maintenance of their preparatory drawings, and many of
them did not survive.) They also used to copy works of painters they admired for the
sake of learning their techniques, but they always remained very close to nature, even
when depicting unnatural themes. Their sources of influence did not detract them
from remaining original in their paintings. De Grazia also mentions their immediate
followers, especially Reni, Domenichino, and Albani, as well as Guercino (who nev-
er joined the Carracci, and never had the opportunity to study directly from them,
but trained himself according to their artistic preferences). These highly trained and
sophisticated painters also combined customary methods of learning with the study
of nature.18
One must differentiate between studying the works of many painters for the sake
of learning, and between the actual imitation or consolidation of many styles in a
single painting as both a theory and a practice. In this respect, it is worth mention-
ing what were considered to be the most coherent literary manifestations of this
concept: the Sonetto in lode di Nicolò Bolognese attributed to Agostino Carracci and
15 ‘Onde habbiamo lo esempio di Zeusi; che havendo a dipingere Helena nel Tempio de’ Crotoniati, elesse
di vedere ignude cinque fanciulle: e togliendo quelle parti di bello dall’una, che mancavano all’altra, ridusse
la sua Helena a tanta perfettione, che ancora ne resta viva la fama.’ Roskill, Dolce’s ‘Aretino’, pp. 130–131. See
also Dolce’s letter to Gasparo Ballini where he repeated the story of Zeuxis again. Roskill, Dolce’s ‘Aretino’, pp.
206–207.
16 ‘Il secondo modo si racconta essere stato offervato da Zeusi pittore celebratissimo nell’antichità, che
volendo formare l’imagine d’una donna compita d’ogni bellezza, si elesse per imitatione la forma di diverse
verginelle, ch’erano tenute singolari, chi in una parte, & chi in un’altra: & sciegliendo da ciascuna d’esse quello
che giudicò piu a proposito, formò da tutte insieme un corpo di donna leggiadrissimo, & di somma eccellenza’.
Paleotti, Discorso, p. 274; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 309.
17 Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 48–49; Hutson, Early Modern Art Theory, p. 169.
18 See De Grazia, ‘Drawings as Means to an End’, pp. 165–182.
Lucio Faberio’s 1603 funerary oration for Agostino, which were both published by
Malvasia.19 The sonnet makes references to a selection of sixteenth-century painters
and artistic centres, which were regarded as the most important sources for painters
to study, and as perfectly representing the ideal of artistic training upheld by the
Accademia degli’ Incamminati:
Whoever a goodly painter seeks to be

Should take the Romans’ drawing to his aid,
Movement from the Venetians, and their shade,
And worthy coloring from Lombardy,
The awesome Michelangelo must see,

The truth to nature Titian has displayed,
The pure and sovereign style Correggio had,
And of a Raphael just symmetry,
Tibaldi’s basis, and his decoration,

Invention of learned Primaticcio’s own,
And just a little grace from Parmigianino.
But leaving so much study and vexation,

Set him to imitate those works alone
Which here were left us by our Niccolino.20
Read in a straightforward manner, the sonnet appears to provide a summary of the

great painters of the previous century. A second reading, however, may reveal Agosti-
no to be simply attempting to complement Nicolò dell’Abate for being an educated,
19 Mahon doubted the authenticity of the sonnet, believing it to be an invention of Malvasia. Dempsey
was the first modern scholar to accept the sonnet as an authentic work written by Agostino Carracci, writing
that ‘the sonnet has been damned as a forgery of Malvasia’s simply by asserting it to be so, supported by an
assumption which is really only a prejudice, that artists and critics do not speak the same language’. Dempsey,
Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, p. 61. For the authenticity of the sonnet see Mahon,
Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 210; See also Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, p. xlvii. For the authenticity
of Faberio’s oration, see Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 137 n. 91; Mahon, ‘Eclecticism and the
Carracci’, p. 306.
20 ‘Chi farsi un buon pittor cerca, e desia/ Il disegno di Roma habbia alla mano,/ La mossa, coll’ ombrar
Veneziano,/ E il degno colorir di Lombardia./ Di Michel Angiol la terribil via,/ Il vero natural di Tiziano,/ Del
Correggio lo stil puro e sovrano,/ E di un Rafel la giusta simetria./ Del Tibaldi ìl decoro e il fondamento,/ Del
dotto Primaticcio l’inventare,/ E un pò di gratia del Parmigianino./ Ma senza tanti studi, e tanto stento,/ Si
ponga solo l’opre ad imitare,/ Che quì lascioci il nostro Nicolino’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 159; for the
English translation, see Holt, A Documentary History of Art, pp. 73–74. See also Bolus-Reichert, The Age of
Eclecticism, p. 26.
knowledgeable, and open-minded painter. It is also possible to offer a third reading

of Agostino’s sonnet, pointing to the types of artistic choices he appreciated—that
is, as an ideal list of sources for ‘Whoever a goodly painter seeks to be’.21 Yet although
this sonnet has become closely associated with eclecticism, it lacks reference to the
idea of giudizio, which was a crucial element in the work of the three Carracci and in
their theory of art, as emphasized by Malvasia in his 1694 Il Claustro di San Michele
in Bosco di Bologna, as well as by Dempsey’s modern scholarship.22 The importance
of judgment is summed up by the following statement, which Malvasia described as
having been made by Ludovico to Annibale: ‘To imitate a single master is to make
oneself his follower and his inferior, while to draw from all of them and also select
things from other painters is to make oneself their judge and leader.’23 As Malvasia’s
quote reveals, judgment, which is closely affiliated with an eclectic approach, was a
key element of the Carracci working methods.
In his funerary oration for Agostino Carracci, Faberio, the Carracci’s secretary,
praised the deceased painter for his ability to imitate ‘what was best, never com-
mitting himself completely to the style of any one painter however great he might
have been’.24 Faberio added that the aim of the Carracci ‘was to gather together the
21 Dempsey emphasized that not enough evidence is known about the activity at the Accademia degli
Incamminati to form an overview of its curriculum and daily activities, and that our knowledge is not direct
but rather based on biographies, especially those written by Malvasia and Bellori, including the painters’
drawings. For the Accademia degli Incamminati and the methods of learning there, see Dempsey, Annibale
Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 42–60; Goldstein, Teaching Art, pp. 33–36. For the Carracci
work methods and their academy, see also Wittkower, The Drawings of the Carracci, p. 9; Bohn, Ludovico
Carracci and the Art of Drawing, pp. 28–29.
22 Malvasia, Il claustro di San Michele in Bosco di Bologna, p. 10; Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the
Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 56–58.
23 ‘perche l’imitare un solo, è un farsi di lui seguace, e’l secondo, che il tor da tutti, scieglier da gli altri, è
un farsi di essi il giudice, e’l caporione.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, p. 388; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the
Carracci, p. 74 and p. 139. See also Loh, ‘New and Improved’, p. 485; Friedlaender, ‘Some Carracci Studies’, p. 265.
In his book review of Charles Dempsey’s Annibale Carracci and the Beginning of Baroque Style, Stephen Pepper
relates to this same idea of judgment and leadership suggested by Ludovico Carracci: ‘When the Carracci
proposed to themselves and to their pupils to investigate the great masters of the past as a means to revive the
practice of art, they did so with a normative value in mind’. Pepper, ‘Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of
Baroque Style by Charles Dempsey’, p. 533. On the concept of judgment, see also Dempsey, Annibale Carracci
and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 57–58; Carrier, Poussin’s Paintings, pp. 221–222.
24 ‘non mai obligandosi alla maniera d’alcun Pittore per grande che sia stato’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice,
I, p. 431. To the best of my knowledge, no one, including Mahon, has ever contested the reliability of this
document. Mahon saw the obvious connection between Faberio’s oration and Lomazzo’s treatise, which he
described as remaining famous throughout the seventeenth century. Mahon viewed Faberio as having relied
heavily on Lomazzo for inspiration, and dismissed him as knowing nothing about art in general or about the
art of the Carracci in particular. I prefer to give Faberio the benefit of the doubt, simply because he worked
in the Carracci academy, was chosen to speak, and duly composed an oration. As noted by Lee, he must have
known a thing or two about the people he worked with. For Faberio’s oration, see Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p.
310; Lee, ‘Review’, p. 211; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, p. 206. See also Goldstein, Visual Fact over
Verbal Fiction, pp. 23–24. For a recent discussion of Faberio’s oration as a manifestation of an eclectic notion
of style, see Hutson, Early Modern Art Theory, p. 151.
perfections found in many artists, and to reduce these to one harmonious entity that
left nothing to be desired’. Unfortunately, Agostino died before achieving this goal.
Faberio mentioned, however, that in the paintings he did complete, the painter had
managed to put
the boldness and sureness of Michelangelo, the softness and delicacy of Titian, the
grace and majesty of Raphael, the loveliness and facility of Correggio, to whose
perfections he added his rare and unusual inventions and compositional ideas, and
with these works he was to give and will continue to give other painters the norm
and example of everything that is needed by an exceptional and perfect painter.25
This oration undoubtedly owes much to Agostino’s sonnet, and therefore should be
appreciated by the same terms of references regarding the education of a painter.
Both Agostino Carracci’s sonnet and Faberio’s oration owe much to Lomazzo and
Armenini, who viewed stylistic variety as a tool for studying how to compose a paint-
ing, and this debt has been acknowledged by Mahon. Lomazzo expressed views sim-
ilar to those mentioned by Pino and Dolce, arguing that in order to create a perfect
painting, one must combine the best qualities of different masters. He stressed that
the role of the art student was to study their works and to make his own choice about
what aspects best suited his own stylistic inclinations. Lomazzo thus offered a meth-
od for the study of art, listing seven great painters who each possessed a unique and
unsurpassable talent concerning one aspect of painting. One should also mention
Armenini, whom Anthony Blunt compares to Lomazzo as another advocate for an
eclectic method. Armenini, like Lomazzo, merely pointed out that an art student
should study the great masters of previous generations before consolidating his own
unique style.26
The method of learning advocated by Lomazzo and Armenini, and evident in
Agostino Carracci’s sonnet and Faberio’s oration, was similarly promoted by the
English painter Sir Joshua Reynolds, whose Sixth Discourse (1774) discusses the
advantage of following earlier masters. Reynolds recommended that painters should
not imitate a single master, because by doing so they will never surpass him and
are bound to remain behind.27 On the other hand, Reynolds asserted that to follow
25 ‘la fierezza, e sicurezza di Michelangelo, la morbidezza, e delicatezza di Titiano, la gratia, e maestà di

Raffaello, la vaghezza, e facilità del Correggio, alle quai perfettioni havendo egli aggionto le sue rari, e singolari
inventioni, & dispositioni, era per dare, e darà pur anco nell’avvenire norma, & essempio a gli altri di quel
tutto, che a raro, e perfetto Pittore si convenga’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 431; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life
of the Carracci, p. 206. See also Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, pp. 23–24.
26 Armenini, On the True Precepts of the Art of Painting, p. 130; Mahon, ‘Eclecticism and the Carracci’, pp.
317–319.
27 Reynolds, Discourses, p. 103. Referring to this same type of imitation in his 1846 essay on the French Salon,
Charles Baudelaire wrote that ‘The sort of man who today comes into the class of the apes—even the cleverest
apes—is not, and never will be, anything but a mediocre painter’. Baudelaire, Art in Paris 1845–1862, p. 115.
several masters is a highly efficient way of mastering techniques of painting well,

since he found it impossible for an individual to obtain the knowledge necessary for
becoming a painter on his own. If painters did not learn from and imitate the works
of their predecessors, he argued, their art would never evolve beyond its earliest stag-
es. If a painter does not imitate others, he added, he is bound to imitate himself.
Reynolds thought that painters should continue to imitate and study other painters
throughout their entire career, viewing this as the only way to vary, remain inventive
and original, and avoid the risk of stagnation and the loss of the ability to produce
great art. Reynolds believed that only through studying the uniqueness and inven-
tiveness of other painters could one eventually learn how to be unique and innova-
tive and how to produce great art, just as we must engage with the thought of others
in order to learn how to think. A painter, he maintained, needed to be educated and
knowledgeable in order to achieve the degree of creativity necessary for producing
great art—just as Michelangelo and Raphael had learned everything about the art
of their predecessors in order to achieve success. Reynolds used the term ‘assem-
blage’ to define the kind of knowledge that a painter was required to have for the
sake of invention—a large compendium of knowledge from which one may pick and
choose. Yet even while imitating one master or the other, Reynolds pointed out, one
must always remain critical, since the interpretation of an original that may advance
one’s own endeavour was preferable to a simple, straightforward copy.28
One of the basic meanings of the term ‘eclecticism’ relates to a process by
which a thinker assimilates various strains of thought into one.29 In other words,
practicing eclecticism is about the processes of picking and choosing without
committing to a single way of thinking, regardless of whether this process is arbi-
trary or based upon the critical employment of judgment concerning one’s choic-
es. There is no single prescription as to whether such an assemblage, combina-
tion, or mixture should be unified into a single homogeneous entity, or whether
the different elements should retain their own unique features. Similarly, there
is no one answer to the question of whether such a combination should gather
the thoughts and styles of other men, or whether it should combine one’s own
different thoughts or styles. Assimilation is thus not a required feature for eclecti-
cism, nor is picking and choosing from other people’s so-called ‘container’, to use
Greene’s vivid terminology. Indeed, one may identify three types of eclecticism in
both the practice and the discourse of early modern art: assimilated eclecticism,
arbitrary eclecticism, and non-assimilated eclecticism. It is this last type of eclec-
ticism that is at the core of this study.
28 Reynolds, Discourses, pp. 95–100.

29 For a summary of the different attitudes, see Donini, ‘The History of the Concept of Eclecticism’, pp. 31–32.
Assimilated Eclecticism – Vasari’s Raphael
Eclecticism involves the act of combining, assembling, and mixing. It may thus
be perceived as an act of borrowing, repeating, quoting, or imitating the works of
another, thus indicating the inferiority of the borrower or imitator and his lack of
creativity. Alternately, it may be perceived as a conscious method characterized by
an appreciation of, and dependence on, other masters, and the ability to absorb their
strengths and weaknesses and eventually create something different in terms of style
or content. This latter view of eclecticism emphasizes that each generation builds its
perceptions upon those of its predecessors, while adding its own special traits. In this
context, John Shearman has mentioned Parmigianino’s Vision of St. Jerome (1526/7,
Figure 1), in which one can find references to Correggio, Raphael, and Michelange-
lo. The sleeping saint on the right is probably an emulation of the sleeping figure
in Correggio’s Madonna of St. Sebastian (Dresden, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister), as
well as of Raphael’s Diogenes in the School of Athens and Michelangelo’s Moses. As
Shearman notes, the painting’s lineage is further revealed by means of additional
references in the painting, yet one cannot deny its ingenuity.30 According to Malvasia,
Ludovico Carracci was speaking of this distinction between emulation and ingenuity
when he said to Annibale that it was important to select among the great painters of
the past and not to commit oneself to a single painter.
The most prominent advocate for an eclectic method was probably Giorgio Vasari,
whose discussion of Raphael singles him out as a master of eclecticism. In his biog-
raphy of the painter, one may find descriptions with a clearly eclectic connotation.
Not only, according to Vasari, did Raphael know how to alter his style, but he was also
able to pick various elements from different old masters and assimilate them into his
own unique works of art:
It is well known that after his stay in Florence Raphael greatly altered and improved
his style, through having seen the works of the foremost masters, and he never
reverted to his former manner, which looks like the work of a different and inferior
hand.31
Clearly, this is an eclectic method of learning—using many styles for the purpose of
arriving at the best stylistic solution. Vasari was much more explicit when he wrote
about Raphael’s stylistic sources:
30 Shearman, Only Connect, p. 239.

31 ‘Nè tacerò che si conobbe, poi che fu stato a Firenze, che egli variò ed abbellì tanto la maniera, mediante
l’aver veduto molte cose e di mano di maestri eccellenti, che ella non aveva che fare alcuna cosa con quella
prima, se non come fussino di mano di diversi e più e meno eccellenti nella pittura.’ Vasari, Le vite de’ più
eccellenti pittori scultori ed architettori, IV, p. 325. For the English translation, see Vasari, The Lives of the
Painters, Sculptors and Architects, II, p. 225.
Figure 1: Parmigianino, Vision of St. Jerome, 1526/7, The National Gallery, London (Photo: © The National Gallery,
London).
This excellent artist studied the old paintings of Masaccio at Florence, and the
works of Leonardo and Michelangelo which he saw induced him to study hard,
and brought about an extraordinary improvement in his art and style.32
Vasari named Masaccio, Leonardo, and Michelangelo, as well as the Florentine

school of painting, as stylistic sources from which Raphael chose to study. He con-
cluded his biography of the painter with what he perceived to be Raphael’s greatest
talent: ‘He thus formed a single style out of many, which was always considered his
own, and was, and will always be, most highly esteemed by artists.’33 Ernst Gombrich
argued that this ability of Raphael, as acknowledged by Vasari, was the same ability
attributed to Annibale by his early biographers. Annibale was perceived as a sav-
iour of painting because he ‘understood the importance of Raphael’s precept and
selected a perfect mixture of styles, thus overcoming the debased and problematic
maniera of the affected imitators of Michelangelo’.34
In defining the stylistic characteristics of the Carracci, Dempsey, too, compared
their achievements to those of Raphael. Dempsey’s focus on Raphael is seen from the
point of view of Vasari, whose terminology does not focus on the painter’s stylistic
uniqueness as a professional practitioner but rather on a terminology that derived
from the vocabulary of studying, and especially from the vocabulary of theory.
Accordingly, Dempsey was not concerned with defining Raphael’s style, but rather
with his sources of learning. In a single paragraph, he mentioned all of the sources
of influence and knowledge and the studies undertaken by the painter in order to
create his art. Raphael, according to Dempsey, imitated, learned, or studied the man-
ners of Perugino and Leonardo, as well as Michelangelo’s works. He studied anato-
my—’the movements of the body, its skeletal structure, its nerves, veins, muscles,
and ligatures’—and learned ‘the principles of nature and of art’. He studied ‘poetry,
perspective, buildings, landscapes, costumes, chiaro and scuro, people of all sexes
and ages, horses and animals, battles, vases, trees, clouds, fires, weather conditions,
and insomma’. He then studied Fra Bartolommeo’s colour and design. Dempsey’s
elaboration on Vasari’s account presents Raphael as an educated, knowledgeable
person. His description employs the verb ‘to imitate’ twice (but only concerning
32 ‘Studiò questo eccellentissimo pittore nella città di Firenze le cose vecchie di Masaccio; e quelle che vide
nei lavori di Lionardo e di Michelagnolo lo feciono attendere; maggiormente agli studi, e per conseguenza
acquistarne miglioramento straordinario all’arte e alla sua maniera.’ Vasari, Le vite de’ più eccellenti pittori
scultori ed architettori, IV, p. 326. For the English translation, see Vasari, The Lives of the Painters, Sculptors and
Architects, II, p. 225. See also Goldstein, who wrote: ‘Vasari’s Raphael is the most striking example of an artist
who benefitted from the study of the best ancient and modern masters.’ Goldstein, ‘Rhetoric and Art History
in the Italian Renaissance and Baroque’, p. 645.
33 ‘fece di molte maniere una sola, che fu poi sempre tenuta sua propria, la quale fu e sarà sempre stimata
dagli artefici infinitamente.’ Vasari, Le vite de’ più eccellenti pittori scultori ed architettori, IV, p. 377. Vasari, The
Lives of the Painters, Sculptors and Architects, II, pp. 245–246.
34 Gombrich, Norm and Form, pp. 101–102.
Raphael’s beginnings), the verb ‘to study’ five times, and the verb ‘to learn’ six times,
thus underscoring his attempt to emphasize Raphael’s abilities and skills as a paint-
er. Nowhere in this paragraph is there a mention of style. Dempsey’s elaboration on
Raphael’s process of learning was meant as an analogy to the Carracci’s own intellec-
tual tendencies, since he was their immediate source of influence. Dempsey’s adop-
tion of Vasari’s intellectual inclinations is very different from Malvasia’s description
of Ludovico’s St. George altarpiece.35 Vasari’s approach followed that of Leon Battista
Alberti, who wrote: ‘For this reason it is useful to take from every beautiful body each
one of the praised parts and always strive by your diligence and study to understand
and express much loveliness. This is very difficult, because complete beauties are
never found in a single body, but are rare and dispersed in many bodies.’36 This per-
ception of Raphael was later adopted by Joshua Reynolds.37
Vasari was not alone in his assessment of Raphael’s eclectic method. Dolce praised
Raphael by comparing him to Michelangelo, while noting the difference between
Michelangelo’s skill at depicting one type of nude body and the variety of styles
(maniere) that Raphael used in his nudes, thus enabling him to distinguish among them
in terms of age and sex. In his Dialogo della pittura or L’Aretino, first published in 1557,
Dolce suggested that Raphael should be acknowledged as the better of the two because
of his stylistic diversity. By contrast, his Aretino notes without appreciation that whoev-
er has seen one nude of Michelangelo’s has seen them all.38 In a letter to Gasparo Ballini
(published by Mark W. Roskill), Dolce wrote that Raphael had two aims:
One was to emulate the beauty of style found in antique statues, and the other to
so vie with nature that, even while he drew his vision of things from the life, he
endowed these things with greater beauty of form, seeking out an integral perfec-
tion in his works, which is not found in the living world. Nature does not bestow
all of her beauties on one single body, that is, and to get many bodies to yield them
up is taxing; while to assemble them subsequently in one figure so that they do not
clash is almost completely impossible.39
35 See Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 68–69. For Vasari’s selective
imitation or eclectic appropriation, see also Williams, Art, Theory, and Culture, p. 81; Cast, The Delight of Art,
p. 139; Cropper, The Domenichino Affair, pp. 105–106; Hutson, Early Modern Art Theory, p. 164. For Vasari’s
uniformity, see also Smyth, Mannerism and Maniera, pp. 5–9.
36 Alberti, On Painting, pp. 92–93.
37 See Reynolds, Discourses, p. 104.
38 ‘Ma nelle altre maniere [Michelangelo] è non solo minore di se stesso, ma di altri ancora; perche egli o
non sa, o non vuole osservar quelle diversità delle età e de i sessi, che si son dette di sopra: nelle quali è tanto
mirabile Rafaello. E, per conchiuderla, chi vede una sola figura di Michel’Angelo, le vede tutte.’ Roskill, Dolce’s
‘Aretino’, pp. 170–172. For Raphael’s diversified figures, see also p. 174.
39 ‘l’uno d’imitar la bella maniera delle statue antiche; e l’altro di contender con la natura, in modo, che veggendo
le cose dal vivo, dava loro piu bella forma, ricercando nelle sue opere una perfettione intera, che non si truova nel
vivo: percioche la natura non porge a un corpo solo tutte le sue bellezza; e mendicarle in molti è difficile, ridurle
poi insieme in una figura, che non discordino, è quasi del tutto impossibile.’ Roskill, Dolce’s ‘Aretino’, pp. 204–207.
Like Vasari and Dolce, Reynolds stressed that Raphael learned from many, imitated
the greatest painters of his time, and was very knowledgeable about the art of the
ancients. Raphael, for Reynolds, was the perfect student, who was able to appropriate
the unique advantages of his predecessors and combine them into his own unified
style.40 As clearly explained by Wittkower, Reynolds’ own method followed Raphael.
He similarly incorporated stylistic elements from the old masters while adapting and
internalizing them to produce his own style, and called this process ‘borrowing’.41
Vasari’s approach coincides with the nineteenth-century perception of eclecti-
cism, as is evident, for example, in the writing of Victor Cousin, whose Du vrai, du
beau, et du bien (1853) argued that every school of painting and every style contained
a seed of beauty that one should embrace and study.42
The idea of eclecticism in artistic discourse pertained mostly to the assimilated or
blended type—the picking and choosing from different sources and assimilation of
stylistic components into a unified, homogeneous, and even original whole. In this
respect, it was no different from the tendencies followed in previous generations, and
was perceived as the ultimate method for learning and establishing a distinct style.
In this context, it is worth mentioning the Dutch still-life painter Philips Angel, who
distinguished between two kinds of borrowing or adding a component for the sake of
improving an artwork. In his encomium ‘Praise of painting’ (Lof der schilder-konst),
published in Leiden in 1642, he differentiated between successful borrowing and the
failed addition of elements taken from other painters. In both cases, he argued, the
painter introduces a stylistic component into his art. Yet whereas the act of borrow-
ing a stylistic component from another painter is subtle and hardly noticeable, addi-
tion is defined by the failure to assimilate the component into the painting. Angel
also mentioned the famous fable of Aesop about the jackdaw that wanted to impress
Jupiter with feathers that did not belong to it. Its failure was due to the other birds’
identification of their own feathers, which they stripped away from the jackdaw and
took back. Another related anecdote provided by Angel concerns a painter who tried
to impress Michelangelo with his art. Yet Michelangelo, who recognized the painter’s
sources, said that if each component in the painting was to be returned to the painter
it was taken from, the canvas would remain blank.43
40 Reynolds, Discourses, p. 104.

42 ‘Il n’y a pas une de ces écoles qui ne represente à sa manière quelque côté du beau, et nous sommes
bien d’avis de les embrasser toutes dans une étude impartiale et bienveillante […] Ce que nous demandons
aux diverses écoles, sans distinction de temps ni de lieu, ce que nous cherchons au midi comme au nord, à
Florence, à Rome, à Venise et à Séville, come à Anvers, à Amsterdam et à Paris, partout où il y a des hommes,
c’est quelque chose d’humain, c’est l’expression d’un sentiment ou d’une idée.’ Cousin, Du vrai, du beau, et du
bien, pp. 220–221. See also Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 69.
43 Hoyle and Miedema, ‘Philips Angel, Praise of Painting’, p. 243.
Arbitrary Eclecticism
Arbitrary eclecticism in seventeenth-century artistic discourse is evident in the artis-

tic theories of Monsignor Giovanni Battista Agucchi and of Giovanni Pietro Bellori.
Agucchi was a high-ranking papal official who saw himself as a patron of the arts
and attracted into his circle well-known artists such as Annibale Carracci and Dome
nichino. Bellori was an antiquarian, art critic, and art theorist. He served as secretary,
advisor, treasurer, and, lastly, as the head rector at the Accademia di San Luca in
Rome and as a papal antiquarian.44 Both writers made a distinction between a good
mixture of styles, characterized by the use of judgment, and a bad assemblage of
styles, consisting of arbitrary picking and choosing—almost certainly a reference to
the Mannerists of the previous century. In the years before Agucchi entered into the
Ludovisi administration, probably between 1607 and 1615, he found the time to shape
his own artistic credo and to commit it to writing. Published only in 1646 as a preface
to Giovanni Massani’s Diverse figure, it was rediscovered and republished in modern
times by Denis Mahon.45
In the opening to his treatise, which related to the idea of assembling and integrat-
ing elements from different sources in a single work of art, Agucchi praised Annibale
Carracci for his ability to combine reality and imagination in his paintings.46 He fur-
ther argued that Annibale ‘proposed for himself at his first arrival in Rome of joining
the fineness of the design of the Roman school with the loveliness of the colours of
that of Lombardy’.47 Annibale’s mixture of styles, according to Agucchi, was evident
in the Farnese Gallery. Hutson traces the roots of Agucchi’s view to previous literary
treatises, most directly to that of Tasso. He refers to this artistic method as idealized
imitation or judicious imitation, but also uses the term ‘eclectic’.48
Agucchi made a distinction between two types of eclecticism, which related to
classical precedents. The first type was the judgmental and critical method, and the
second type was the arbitrary one. For him, those who exercised eclecticism in a
44 Bell, ‘Introduction’, p. 10.

45 Giovanni Antonio Massani’s edition contained 80 etchings of drawings by the Carraccis, which depicted
the merchants and artisans of Bologna. The etchings were made by Simon Guillain the Younger. See Mahon,
Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 240–258.
46 ‘Annibale Carracci Pittore de nostri tempi dell’eccellenza, che à voi (amatori di così bello artificio)
può esser manifesta, fu riputato da coloro, che in vita lo conobbero, esser dotato di una felicià d’ingegno
maravigliosa; con la quale, accompagnando egli con suo gran lo studio, e la fatica, arrivò ad havere così
pronta, & ubbidiente la mano ad esprimer col disegno gli oggetti, che vedeva, e s’imaginava.’ Mahon, Studies
in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 233.
47 Dooley, Italy in the Baroque, p. 435. ‘havendo egli conseguito quel fine, che nel suo primo arrivar a Roma
si propose, di congiugnere insieme la finezza del Disegno della Scuola Romana, con la vaghezza del colorito di
quelle di Lombardia.’ Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 257.
48 Hutson writes that ‘Tasso’s premise that the model for eclectic appropriation used by poets is applicable
to the visual arts’. Hutson, Early Modern Art Theory, p. 156.
positive way did so because they wanted to perfect their art and capture images not
as they are but as they ought to be.
The second type of painters created what Agucchi defined as bad art:
Artists were content to satisfy the eyes of the people by the loveliness of the colours
and by the embellishments of the costumes, using things lifted from here and there
without context and rarely joined well together.49
For Agucchi, the purpose of a good painting was not so much the portrayal (ritrarre)
of nature but rather the imitation (imitare) and re-creation of nature.50 Nevertheless,
in the above quotation one may find an acknowledgment of the type of non-assimi-
lated eclecticism that this study wishes to emphasize.51
Agucchi was followed by Bellori, whose Idea dell bello was defined in a lecture
delivered at the Roman Academy of St. Luke in 1664, and later published in his Vite.
In his Idea, Bellori wrote that art is superior to nature because it strives to perfection.
He elaborated on Pino, Dolce, and Lomazzo’s comparisons between art and nature,
and on Firenzuola and Agucchi’s perceptions of the faults of nature, which require a
painter to draw different parts from different models. Lomazzo named earlier paint-
ers ‘improving the weakness of nature with art’,52 mentioning, among others, Correg-
gio and Giorgione.
Bellori reiterated Agucchi’s ideal of the selection of natural forms, arguing that
supreme beauty is conceived out of the best parts of different figures joined together
in the imagination to form a grand and unified entity—the same characterization
of greatness found in Vasari’s discussion of Raphael. Bellori added that the ancient
artists had already accomplished that mission, so that painters should imitate their
work for the sake of developing their skills. In addition to Zeuxis, ‘who chose from
five virgins to fashion the famous image of Helen’ and ‘did not believe that he would
be able to find in a single body all those perfections that he sought for the beauty
of Helen, since nature does not make any particular thing perfect in all its parts’,53
49 ‘contentandosi gli artefici di pascer gli occhi del popolo con la vaghezza de’ colori, e con gli addobbi delle
vestimenta, e valendosi di cose di là e di quà levate con povertà di contorni, e di rado bene insieme congionte.’
Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 247. For the English translation, see Dooley, Italy in the Baroque,
pp. 428–429. For the arbitrary method, see Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 247. For the English
translation, see Dooley, Italy in the Baroque, p. 430.
50 For the use of these terms in this way, see Boschloo, The Limits of Artistic Freedom, p. 11.
51 Sohm, Style in the Art Theory of Early Modern Italy, p. 22. See also Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction,
p. 29.
52 ‘E cosi tutti coloro che in questa guisa aiutando la debolezza della natura, con làrte hanno operato, sono
stati eccellenti, & famosi al mondo.’ Lomazzo, Idea del tempio della pittura, p. 9. For the English translation, see
Lomazzo, Idea of the Temple of Painting, p. 52.
53 ‘Ma Zeusi, che con la scelza di cinque vergini formò l’immagine di Elena […] Imperoche non pensò egli
di poter trovare in un corpo solo tutte quelle perfettioni, che cercava per la venustà di Helena, metre la natura
Bellori brought to the fore other ancient men who advocated this ideal, such as Pro-
clus, Cicero, Maximus Tyrius, and Parrhasius. For Bellori, a non-selective imitation of
nature would produce inferior art. This was how Demetrius was perceived in his own
time, and this was how Bellori regarded Caravaggio. Bellori explained his own artis-
tic credo concerning the contrast between nature and the imagination by providing
examples of classical artists, such as Phidias, who ‘aroused wonder in spectators with
his forms of heroes and gods because he imitated the Idea rather than nature’,54 cre-
ating in his mind a vision of beauty that was suitable for rendering a god. Bellori also
referred to Apollonius of Tyana, who ‘teaches us […] that the imagination makes the
painter wiser than imitation.’55
Non-Assimilated Eclecticism – A Definition
Thus far, we have encountered two types of eclecticism. The first type was defined
by picking and choosing different parts from the most beautiful female models, from
the old masters, or from different locations in nature, and assimilating them into one
original style (as in Vasari’s description of Raphael). The second type of eclecticism
involved picking and choosing arbitrarily from different sources without exercising
judgment (Agucchi’s Mannerists).
Two additional types of eclecticism that are discernible in early modern painting
are characterized by the absence of any attempt by a painter to assimilate the dif-
ferent styles into a homogeneous composition. The first type is the one referred to
by the term ‘pastiche’, which implies a process of picking and choosing consciously
from earlier painters and retaining their unique stylistic features, so that they remain
recognizable.56 The second type is a carefully planned combination of several differ-
ent individual styles within a single painting, which do not relate to a specific source
of influence. These two types of non-assimilated eclecticism differ in terms of the
kinds of styles they combine. Whereas the first type is characterized by an assem-
blage of recognizable motifs copied from earlier painters, which makes the detection
of the original sources rather simple, the second type consists of a mixture of differ-
ent styles developed by the painter himself. The distinct styles evident in this second
non fà perfetta cosa alcuna particolare in tutte le parti.’ Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni,
pp. 4–5; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 58.
54 ‘Di questo fallo non venne altrimente imputato Fidia, che indusse meraviglia ne’riguardanti con le forme
de gli Heroi, e de gli Dei, per haver imitato piùtsto l’Idea, che la Natura.’ Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et
architetti moderni, p. 5; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 58. For Bellori’s eclectic approach, see also
Howard, ‘Carracci School of Drawings in Sacramento’, p. 370.
55 ‘che la fantasia rende più seggio il pittore, che l’imitatione’. Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti
moderni, p. 6; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 58.
56 ‘Pastiche is a kind of imitation that you are meant to know is an imitation.’ Dyer, Pastiche, p. 1; Radisich,
Pastiche, Fashion, and Galanterie, p. 33.
Figure 2: Giacopo Giovannini after Guido Reni, The Farmers Presenting Gifts to St. Benedict, engraving, 1694, in:
Carlo Cesare Malvasia, Il claustro di San Michele in Bosco di Bologna (Photo: © Author).
type of eclecticism might have been inspired by different sources, yet were consoli-
dated by an individual painter and are recognizable as his own. It is this second type
of ‘non-assimilated eclecticism’ that forms the core of this study.
Malvasia exemplified the act of borrowing freely from different sources while
retaining their styles—the most rudimentary form of pastiche—in his description
of Guido Reni’s Farmers Presenting Gifts to St. Benedict, which was created in 1604
for the Cloister of San Michele in Bosco. He pointed out four different styles in Reni’s
painting, which has since been destroyed.57 All that remains on the walls are traces
of what was once a joint project of Ludovico, Reni, and a few of Ludovico’s students,
among them Alessandro Tiarini, Francesco Brizio, and Lucio Massari.58 The entire
cycle featured 21 scenes from the life of St. Benedict and sixteen scenes from the
lives of St. Cecilia and St. Valerianus. Reni’s contribution to the joint project is known
today through engraved copies made in 1694 by Giacopo Giovannini to accompany
Malvasia’s Il claustro di San Michele in Bosco di Bologna (Figure 2), which was pub-
lished that year. In his Felsina Pittrice, Malvasia described the painting in a typically
eclectic way, writing that the saint was
coming out of a cave high up in a mountain, and receiving gifts offered him by the
rustic inhabitants who varied in sex, age, coloring, size, attitude, and dress. These
included a lovely Raphaelesque girl clothed in veiling, holding a basket of eggs.
Behind her is seen the hand and smiling face of an older woman painted in the
manner of Correggio. Both of them look out at the spectators with such vivacity
and spirit that they seem to breathe. A shepherd painted in the manner of Titian
is playing a flute with hands that seem of living flesh. Another shepherd of no less
beauty listens attentively to him. There is also a woman painted in the manner of
Annibale, with a nursing child at her breast, and another woman who with her
right hand offers a basket of apples, from which the greedy child cannot take his
eyes. Leaving aside many other figures, the most prominent of all is a great form,
completely nude, who pulls a balky donkey with such awesome and vigorous force
that the outlines might have been drawn by Michelangelo.59
57 For an engraving of this lost painting, see Malvasia, Il claustro di San Michele in Bosco di Bologna, n. p.;
Pepper, Guido Reni, cat. no. 15. See also Pepper, ‘Caravaggio and Guido Reni’, p. 327.
58 Malvasia mentions the commission received by Ludovico Carracci and the inclusion of his students in
the project. Ludovico allowed them to render a few of the scenes ‘so that they too might win fame as painters’.
Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, p. 213. (‘gli altri s’acquistassero anch’essi fama di pennello i suoi
Giovani’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 435.) Stephen Pepper suggested that Guido received his commission
independently of Ludovico, explaining why he received a higher payment. See Pepper, Guido Reni, p. 214.
59 ‘Finse, che dalla parte sopra di un Monte uscito da un antro il Santo, con certa piacevolezza, che punto
non pregiudica alla gravità, riceva varii doni offertigli da que’ rusticani abitatori, varii di sesso, di età, di
carnagione; diversi di proporzione, d’attitudini, e di vestiri. Sul gusto di Rafaelle una graziosa giovane ricinta di
sottilissimi veli, con canestrello d’uvova, sovra la cui spalla una compagna più vecchia, sul gusto del Correggio,
Reni, according to Malvasia, combined figures taken from different identifiable sources. He
painted the girl with a basket of eggs in the manner of Raphael, the older woman behind
her in the manner of Correggio, the shepherd playing the flute after Titian, the nursing
woman with a child in the lower left corner in the manner of Annibale, and a nude after
Michelangelo. Raphael, Correggio, Titian, Annibale, and Michelangelo are all among the
sources that Guido used in order to produce this witty pastiche. According to Malvasia,
Ludovico Carracci, who saw the painting before it was unveiled, praised it by saying that
the student had surpassed his teacher.60 He was clearly alluding to the importance of study-
ing the styles of earlier painters, while maintaining that Guido was the perfect student.
The difference between Vasari’s Raphael and Malvasia’s Reni is that Vasari attribut-
ed the act of assimilation to Raphael, while Malvasia focused on Reni’s ability to main-
tain in his copied figures the unique characteristics of each of his predecessors, thus
creating a different kind of eclecticism that was not predicated upon assimilation.
The unique characteristics of these different sources of influence were intentional-
ly maintained, allowing for easy identification by connoisseurs. Reni’s depiction of
The Farmers Presenting Gifts to St. Benedict is a typical example of this approach. In
an article on the transcription of artistic motifs borrowed from earlier representa-
tions, Leo Steinberg addressed different terms pertaining to this type of non-assimi-
lated composition, such as quoting, imitating, plagiarizing, stealing, emulating, and
appropriating, while distinguishing between painters who intentionally deployed a
pre-existing motif and those who did not.61 What is common to all these terms and is
important for our discussion is that they refer to the borrowing of artistic prototypes
from existing works of art created by earlier painters. Important for Steinberg’s argu-
ment is that modern painters borrowed such prototypes in order ‘to give a forgotten
oldtimer what he stood most in need of, a seat up front, a free ride into the modern
world, reviving him, as it were, by a change of stylistic environment’.62
posta la mano, e la testa ridente, guardano ambidue gli spettatori, con tanta vivacità e spirito, che par che
spirino. Sul gusto di Tiziano un pastorello, che sonando un flauto con certe mani di viva e tenera carne, viene
attentamente da un’altro, di non minor bellezza, ascoltato. Sul gusto di Annibale una donna con un bambino
lattante in collo, ed un’altro adulto, che con la destra ella spinge ad offerire una canestrella di pomi, da’quali
non sa il golosello staccar gli occhi; e lasciandone tanti altri, sul principio un gran nudo intero, così terribile,
e risentito nel tirare per forza un’asinello restìo, che pareva che Michelangelo l’avesse in tal forma contornato,
perche più tenero poi, e più ricoperto di vera carne ci venisse dalla Scuola di Lombardia’. Malvasia, Felsina
Pittrice, II, pp. 13–14. For the English translation, see Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni, p. 48.
60 ‘Ma fra tutte le più insigni fu la storia di S. Benedetto fatta, ancorche a olio, con non minor freschezza,
nel famoso cortile di S. Michele in Bosco, nel quale Ludovico, e suoi seguaci (come si disse) avean fatto
l’ultimo sforzo, per mostrare in simile concorrenza il loro valore: poiche finita che l’ebbe, fece stupire lo stesso
Lodovico, che prima di scoprirsi, la vidde, pregatone da Guido, perche vi dicesse sopra qualche cosa, e ne lo
avvertisse: atterì quegl’altri, che si conobbero di gran lunga superati, e fece dire a tutti, che passato egli avesse
anche il Maestro in certa morbidezza, venustà, e grandezza, alla quale nè anche fossero mai giunti gli stessi
Carracci.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 13. See also Sohm, Style in the Art Theory of Early Modern Italy, p. 35.
For the painting and copies, see Pepper, Guido Reni, p. 214.
61 Steinberg, ‘The Glorious Company’, pp. 8–31.
62 Steinberg, ‘The Glorious Company’, p. 28.
One example of the second type of non-assimilated eclecticism is Ludovico’s

St. Michael and St. George altarpiece (Plate 1), which was described at the beginning
of the Introduction. Although one may find descriptions of all types of eclecticism in
seventeenth-century discourse, this study centres on the second type of non-assimi-
lated eclecticism, which was unique to the Bolognese painters.
The paintings at the centre of this study differ from those in which one may dis-
cern the other types of eclecticism on one fundamental point: While they all empha-
sized the importance of studying the styles of the great masters of the past and of
making use of their advantages, their outcomes were different. Raphael, for example,
was the most accomplished student in terms of his ability to assimilate his prede-
cessors’ art into a single unified whole. Yet in contrast to Raphael, as well as to the
non-assimilated pastiche and the arbitrary use of different styles, the type of eclec-
ticism that gained popularity in Bologna, and which was detected by Malvasia in
Ludovico’s St. George altarpiece, is characterized by an attempt to compose a paint-
ing whose distinct styles (developed by the painter himself) each retain their unique
stylistic features. It seems clear that Bolognese painters were expected to study the
styles of earlier great artists and to develop their own styles by manipulating these
different stylistic elements in a single work of art, so that their combination accentu-
ated the message communicated by the painting. This use of a combination of styles
that each retain their own features, and which I have thus suggested calling non-as-
similated eclecticism, may also be described as iconographic eclecticism, or perhaps
even as an eclecticism of personal styles. Bolus-Reichert suggested the expression
‘coexistence of styles’, which seems to offer an additional term for describing the
same phenomenon.63 It should be stressed, though, that artistic references to earlier
painters are not a precondition for an eclectic process of picking and choosing, nor
are assimilation or unification.
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63 Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 42.

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2. Ideology
Abstract
Chapter Two will explore the ideological context of non-assimilated eclecticism, which
is made evident in Paleotti’s book on religious painting. Both the writer and the paint-
ers discussed in this book belonged to the same cultural sphere, which was characterized
by the resonance of very specific ideas. Paleotti’s attitude towards iconography was given
expression by means of stylistic tools. His separation between modes of representation
was transformed into a differentiation in terms of design, colour, scale, composition, and
movement. This chapter continues with an exploration of Guido Reni’s visual elaboration
on the dichotomy between disegno and colore as a pictorial manifestation of non-assim-
ilated eclecticism. Guido’s painting will then be compared with Guercino’s more tradi-
tional conception of this same subject. Finally, an examination of Malvasia’s biography
of Ludovico Carracci will suggest some additional concerns addressed through the use of
several styles in a single work of art.
Keywords: Gabriele Paleotti, disegno, colore, Guido Reni, Guercino, Carlo Cesare
Malvasia
The ideological justification for non-assimilated eclecticism is found in Gabriele Paleotti’s

Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images (Discorso intorno alle imagini sacre et profane). In
his unique commentary on what constitutes a religious painting, Paleotti laid the funda-
mental principles for an eclectic approach that combines different styles in a single work
of art. The Bolognese prelate began by distinguishing between truth and nature, a distinc-
tion essential to the separation between terrestrial and celestial scenes included within
the same pictorial frame. Paleotti also formulated a new approach to the representation
of saints, arguing that the portrayal of those whose visage was known should emphasize
their unique features, while those whose features remained unknown should be depicted
in a truthful manner. Once again, one can note a distinction between different modes
of representations, culminating in the representation of two types of saints, which are
combined in a single painting. Paleotti’s theological emphasis corresponds to the artistic
discourses of the time and especially that of Lomazzo.
In his 1590 Idea del tempio della pittura, Giovanni Paolo Lomazzo elaborated on
Paolo Pino’s comment on what constitute the two most perfect paintings. For him,
they were those of Adam and Eve:
doi: 10.5117/9789462986015/ch02
Yet I would say that he who wants to conceive two paintings of the highest perfec-
tion, such as one of Adam and one of Eve—the most noble bodies in the world—
must, in my opinion, have Adam drawn by Michelangelo, colored by Titian, and the
proportion and harmony come from Raphael; Eve must be drawn by Raphael and
colored by Antonio da Correggio.1
Lomazzo selected four painters, dividing them into two pairs.2 Each pair was charged
with the rendition of a single protagonist, thus constructing a painting with two con-
spicuous styles. Like Pino before him, Lomazzo acknowledged that Michelangelo
and Titian complement one another, while adding a second style that was a com-
bination of Raphael and Correggio. One may argue that Lomazzo was thinking of
pendant paintings, and thus advocated for an eclectic approach so that the figures of
Adam and Eve would be related, as if forming a single work of art. Indeed, there are
many pendants of Adam and Eve among fifteenth- and sixteenth-century paintings,
especially in Northern art—most notably in Jan van Eyck’s Ghent altarpiece and in
Albrecht Dürer’s Prado panels.
Apposite here is Paolo Pino’s famous dictum in his Dialogo di Pittura (1548), where
Lauro says to Fabio: ‘If Titian and Michelangelo constituted a single body, that is,
if Titian’s colour were added to Michelangelo’s design, it could be called the god of
painting.’3 It is clear that the basic idea reflected in his definition of the best painting
is that it combines or mixes elements from two great masters of the past, Titian and
Michelangelo, into a homogeneous whole.4
Lomazzo’s approach is given expression in Domenichino’s letter to Francesco
Angeloni (published in Bellori’s Vite), in which Domenichino related to Lomazzo’s
ideal painting in the following words: ‘He [Lomazzo] also says that if one were to
make a perfect picture, it would be Adam and Eve, Adam drawn by Michelangelo,
painted by Titian; Eve drawn by Raphael and painted by Correggio.’5 Domenichino
does not seem to appreciate Lomazzo’s combinations. He ends the letter by pointing
1 ‘Mà dirò bene che à mio parere chi volesse formare due quadri di somma profetione come sarebbe d’uno
Adamo, & d’un Eva, che sono corpi nobilissimi al mondo; bisognarebbe che l’Adamo si dasse à Michel Angelo
da disegnate, à Titiano da colorare, togliendo la proportione, & convenienza da Rafaello, & l’Eva si disegnasse
da Rafaello, & si colorisse da Antonio da Coreggio: che questi due sarebbero i miglior quadri che fossero mai
fatti al mondo.’ Lomazzo, Idea del tempio della pittura, p. 60. For the English translation, see Lomazzo, Idea of
the Temple of Painting, p. 93. Blunt relates to Lomazzo’s idea as eclectic. See also Blunt, Artistic Theory in Italy,
p. 157.
2 See Blunt, Artistic Theory in Italy, pp. 156–157. For Lomazzo, see Kemp, ‘“Equal Excellences”’, p. 21.
3 ‘et se Titiano, & Michiel Angelo fussero un corpo solo, over al disegno di Michiel Angelo aggiŏtovi il
colore di Titiano, se gli potrebbe dir lo dio della pittura.’ Pino, Dialogo di pittura, p. 24; See Pardo, ‘Paolo Pino’s
“Dialogo di Pittura”’, p. 358.
4 Anthony Blunt suggested that in this dictum, Pino hints at the theory of eclecticism. See Blunt, Artistic
Theory in Italy, p. 85.
5 ‘Dice ancora che à fare un quadro perfetto sarebbe Adamo, & Eva; l’Adamo disegnato da Miche Angelo,
colorito da Titiano: l’Eva disegnato da Rafaelle, e colorita dal Coreggio […]’ Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et
architetti moderni, p. 359; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 272.
Ideology 59
out his errors: ‘now Your Honor, just see what someone who errs in first principles
falls into.’6
Domenichino’s letter seems to indicate that he mistook Lomazzo’s description of
learning, which was very common in the sixteenth century, for a description of an
eclectic approach. Bellori, who published the letter, made this idea widely known.
Domenichino described four different sources for the painter’s stylistic choices. Adam
and Eve are thus depicted in two different manners, combining two styles in a sin-
gle painting. This combination is decidedly eclectic, and is similar to the way Malvasia
wrote about Ludovico Carracci’s St. George altarpiece. Yet whereas Domenichino men-
tioned the sources of each style, Malvasia related to a combination of styles developed
by the painter himself—Ludovico—without elaborating on his sources of influence.
It would be interesting to examine a painting of Adam and Eve by Domenichino
and see whether he gave expression to his rejection of Lomazzo’s idea. Richard Spear
accepts as genuine and authentic three versions of God the Father Rebuking Adam
and Eve,7 which vary in style and execution. In at least one of these versions, today
at the Musée de Grenoble (Figure 3), Domenichino differentiated between the ren-
dition of Adam and that of Eve in terms of both shape and colour, yet it would be
difficult to relate these differences to what the painter had learned from and disliked
about Lomazzo’s description.
Domenichino’s letter, and especially its mention of Lomazzo’s preferences, show
that an awareness of non-assimilated eclecticism existed in the artistic discourse
of the time. Both Domenichino and Lomazzo seem to have adhered to a notion of
eclecticism that has both visual and verbal resonances, most significantly in Paleot-
ti’s Discorso.
A visual manifestation of non-assimilated eclecticism that confirms to this ideo-
logical perspective is evident in a painting by Guido Reni, which shows the personi-
fication of the essences of the creative process—Alliance between Disegno and Colo-
re (Figure 4). Guido’s depiction of the alliance between design and colour, which
was painted in the first half of the seventeenth century, gives visual expression to
an eclectic approach designed to emphasize the complementary characteristics of
distinct stylistic components by fashioning a Neo-Platonic contradiction between
them. In what follows, Reni’s unique approach will be accentuated in comparison
with Guercino’s rendition of the same subject—the interrelationship between
design and colour (Plate 2). As this discussion will reveal, each of these undisputed
stars of Bolognese painting after the Carracci expressed a different approach to the
roles of these two components in the formation of a painting.
6 See also Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 120, n. 40.
7 One version is at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D. C. Another version is part of the Chatsworth
House collection. See Spear, Domenichino, I, pp. 239–241, pp. 264–265, pp. 279–281. Spear, ‘Some Domenichino
Cartoons’, pp. 147–150; Loh, ‘New and Improved’, pp. 491–492.
Figure 3: Domenichino, The Rebuke of Adam and Eve, 1623/5, Musée de peinture et de sculpture, Grenoble (Photo:
Ville de Grenoble / Musée de Grenoble – J.L. Lacroix).
The idea of non-assimilated eclecticism is also evident in Malvasia’s attempt to

analyse the unique contribution of the Bolognese painters almost a hundred years
after Paleotti, in his descriptions of such painters as Ludovico Carracci and Guido
Reni. The contrast between Malvasia and Bellori serves to enhance our understanding
Ideology 61
Figure 4: Guido Reni, Alliance between Disegno and Colore, 1620/5, Louvre, Paris (Photo: © Author).
of local Bolognese eclecticism. A comparison between Malvasia’s biography of

Ludovico and Bellori’s biography of Annibale Carracci’s early years in Bologna will
disclose the extent of eclecticism identified by the Bolognese biographer (Malvasia)
as opposed to the Roman biographer (Bellori), who emphasized other matters.
This chapter is dedicated to the principles of eclecticism as elaborated in three
different sources. The first source is Paleotti’s religious treatise, in which one may dis-
cern two important aspects of eclecticism that later were implemented in painterly
practice: truth and nature. The second source is a painting by Reni that addresses the
notion of eclecticism through a contrast between the two most central components
of painting, disgno and colore. The third source is Malvasia’s biography of the Carrac-
ci in which historical and theoretical accounts are introduced to explain the use of
more than one style in a single painting.
Gabriele Paleotti’s Discourse on Sacred Images
In his introduction to the recent English translation (2012) of Paleotti’s Discourse,

Paolo Prodi points out that, although it is undeniable that Paleotti had a direct and
personal relationship with painters working in Bologna, the reception of his pro-
posals by artists has remained an insufficiently explored terrain. Much of modern
art-historical scholarship centred on the existence of a unique Tridentine style. Prodi
brought to the fore the short historiography of the post-Trent artistic evolution, and
especially the debate around the actual existence of such a unique style.8 Yet none
of these accounts focused sufficiently on Gabriele Paleotti, his discourse, and the
reception of his requests.
One exception is Anton Boschloo’s seminal book on Annibale Carracci’s Bolog-
nese period, which does pay significant attention to Paleotti and to his influence
on artistic developments in Bologna. Paleotti, like other church leaders, was trying
to implement the decisions of the Council of Trent. Yet as Boschloo rightly points
out, given that Italy was a politically, socially, and economically divided country,
one should limit the examination of Paleotti’s approach to his diocese in Bologna,
since the prelate was directing his explanation of the decisions of the Council of
Trent specifically to the painters of that city. By acting as an intermediary between
the Council and the painters of his diocese in matters of sacred paintings, he was
following the Council’s demand that bishops take responsibility for the contents of
religious painting. The Council’s resolution was both comprehensive and vague, thus
providing prelates with the liberty to focus on their own interpretations. The Council
demanded decorum in representations, yet each bishop had a different view of what
constituted decorum, historical reliability, and tradition. Paleotti’s highly detailed
account, which was unique among sixteenth-century interpreters sought to provide
straightforward instructions concerning what was expected of painters.9
Boschloo argues that Paleotti’s rigorous demands were the reason that no painter,
even in Bologna, followed his ideas closely. Still, a few of his conceptual formulations
did find resonance in the works of Bolognese painters, especially in the paintings
of the Carracci. Their paintings, Boschloo remarks, were aimed at ‘a community of
believers’, and thus took into consideration both the proximity of the work of art to
the viewer, and the latter’s ability to understand what he saw. The choice to depict
the holy figures as realistically as possible thus stemmed from a need to persuade the
viewers that what they saw was true, tangible, and authentic.
8 Prodi, ‘Introduction’, p. 26. See also Stephen Pepper, who suggested that the Carracci reform in art be
examined in the context of the work of Carlo Borromeo, Gabrielle Paleotti, and Filippo Neri. Pepper, ‘Annibale
Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style by Charles Dempsey’, pp. 532–533. See also Bonfait, ‘De Paleotti à
G. B. Agucchi’, pp. 84–86.
9 Boschloo, Annibale Carracci in Bologna, I, pp. 144–146. See also Boschloo, The Limits of Artistic Freedom, p. 100.
Ideology 63
A recent attempt to show Paleotti’s influence on the Bolognese painter Lavinia

Fontana has been made by Patricia Rocco, who argues that Lavinia formulated her
paintings while considering both Paleotti’s religious claims and Aldrovandi’s scientif-
ic agenda. As Rocco writes, one may find in Fontana’s religious works a combination
of iconic devotional figures, religious narrative, and historical accuracy that accord-
ed with Paleotti’s aim. Lavinia’s paintings were ‘scientifically provable, religious nar-
ratives that also contained the power of Byzantine icons to move the faithful’.10
Paleotti’s call to painters employs a terminology that supports an eclectic meth-
od, and which may be compared to Lomazzo in terms of these two writers’ shared
emphasis on combination: Paleotti’s division between truth and nature resonated in
Lomazzo’s stylistic division between Adam and Eve. Thus, Paleotti’s ideological call
to separate the celestial and the terrestrial realms, his division between vice and vir-
tue, and his distinction between modes of representing saints whose facial features
were well known and between ones whose appearance remained unknown, result-
ed in a non-assimilated eclectic approach. These two features of Paleotti’s discourse
established an intellectual context for the artistic choices made by the Bolognese
referred to in Chapter Three.
In his Discorso, the prelate suggested, although not explicitly, a combination or
assemblage of more than one style in a single work of art, and Bolognese painters of
the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries followed this suggestion. Indeed,
the eclecticism, mixture, assemblage, or combination of styles that one finds in sev-
enteenth-century painting in Bologna can be directly related to the change that Pale-
otti was trying to introduce.
Paleotti, who viewed himself as a frustrated religious authority in Bologna, has
been viewed by modern scholars as highly influential in the Carracci reform of paint-
ing.11 His own subjective impression concerning his lack of authority was manifested
in a letter to Carlo Borromeo, in which he wrote that he himself was ‘a bishop with
the mitre only, without the crosier’.12 Paleotti compared his weak position and lack of
governmental authority to the Papal Legate. Ruth S. Noyes views Paleotti’s efforts as
an implicit criticism of the pope and the curia, whose campaign to implement the
decisions of the Council of Trent was not rigorous enough in his opinion. According
to Noyes, the archbishop desired Rome to be much more actively engaged in imple-
menting the Trent decrees.13
10 Rocco, The Devout Hand, p. 63.

11 On Paleotti’s book, see Prodi, Il Cardinale Gabriele Paleotti, II, pp. 527–562; Prodi, Ricerche sulla teorica
delle arti figurative nella Riforma Cattolica, pp. 35–53; Jedin, ‘Das Tridentinum und die Bildenden Künste’, pp.
321–339; Boschloo, Annibale Carracci in Bologna, I, pp. 121–141; Jones, ‘Art Theory as Ideology’, pp. 127–139;
Schildgen, ‘Cardinal Paleotti and the Discorso’, pp. 8–16.
12 Paleotti’s letter is cited in Prodi, The Papal Prince, p. 153.
13 Noyes, ‘Aut numquid’, pp. 245–249.
For the sake of the sacra picta, Paleotti was planning to write five books on reli-
gious art. Yet he managed to complete only two, which he published in 1582, dis-
tributing them exclusively to friends and colleagues. He believed in the power of
images and in their ability to provoke piety in those who saw them: ‘whoever could
gaze with his eyes on the face of virtue and honesty’, he wrote concerning images
that personify or are identified with virtue, ‘would be inflamed with a marvellous
desire for it’.14
It is difficult to estimate to what extent the Bolognese painters were familiar
with Paleotti’s Discorso. Did they actually read the books (as suggested, for exam-
ple, by Sydney J. Freedberg),15 did they hear about the ideas they promulgated
second-hand, or did they simply belong to the same cultural period as Paleotti?
One way or another, it is clear that they were aware of the themes he addressed.
They could have learned about Paleotti’s ideas from the prelate himself, given that
he was not only the supreme authority on religious matters in Bologna, but was
also very much involved in the cultural life of the city. He preached frequently—
every Sunday as well as on some weekdays—and was very much involved in the
social affairs of the city, even if he thought differently of his own involvement,
as indicated in the letter to Borromeo mentioned above. According to Boschloo,
Paleotti did more than was expected of him, driven by his aspiration to transform
Bologna into the new Christian republic.16 He was very well versed in artistic mat-
ters, and if we accept Charles Dejob’s commentary, he even read Vasari’s Lives of the
Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects.17 Moreover, Paleotti also enter-
tained personal connections with the city’s artists. Prodi and Boschloo mention
three painters who helped Paleotti to consolidate his theoretical ideas: Prospero
Fontana, Domenico Tibaldi, and Pirro Ligorio.18 Additionally, Agostino Carracci
dedicated two engravings to Paleotti: an Adoration of the Magi in 1579 and a map
of the city in 1581.19
14 ‘che chi potesse con gli occhi rimirare la faccia della virtù & honestà, si accenderebbe di meraviglioso
desiderio di quella’. Paleotti, Discorso, p. 243; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 281. See also
Gage, Painting as Medicine in Early Modern Rome, p. 4 and p. 6.
15 Freedberg, Circa 1600, p. 88.
16 Ruth S. Noyes argues that the Tridentine reform in painting was a localized phenomenon advanced by
local dignitaries, each according to his own perceptions and abilities. Noyes, ‘Aut numquid’, pp. 240–241. See
also Boschloo, Annibale Carracci in Bologna, I, pp. 110–111 and p. 139.
17 Dejob, L’ Influence du Concile de Trente, p. 247.
18 Prodi, Il Cardinale Gabriele Paleotti, II, p. 532; Boschloo, Annibale Carracci in Bologna, I, p. 144 and p. 152;
Murphy, Lavinia Fontana, p. 16; Rocco, The Devout Hand, p. 46.
19 The map is mentioned by Agostino Carracci in a letter he wrote to Paleotti. See Jay, Recueil de Lettres sur
la Peinture, la Sculpture et l’Architecture, p. 231. See also Prodi, Il Cardinale Gabriele Paleotti (1522–1597), II, p.
548; Prodi, Ricerche sulla teorica delle arti figurative nella Riforma Cattolica, p. 68; Boschloo, Annibale Carracci
in Bologna, II, p. 238, n. 26; Dempsey, ‘The Carracci Reform of Painting’, p. 246; Gage, ‘Teaching Them to Serve
and Obey’, pp. 73–76.
Ideology 65
As noted, Paleotti’s aim was to define the framework of religious art and the ways in
which art could be used to teach its viewers right from wrong—‘to embrace virtue and
shun vice’.20 He wrote: ‘The Christian who has to trade his way to heaven in this life, must
have perfect awareness of all the things he deals in, and know which are good, which are
better, and which best, so as to cling to the supreme one as much as possible.’21 Adopting
St. Gregory the Great’s famous dictum that ‘pictures are meant to serve as books for the
illiterate’ as his point of departure, he directed both patrons and painters to abstain from
abusing the Holy Scriptures.22 In this regard, one of his goals was to shift away from the
Mannerist, pleasurable style of painting that was current at the time towards a more
utilitarian approach for explaining and clarifying religious ideas to the illiterate.23
Book 1 Chapter 30 marks the beginning of a discussion that focuses both on the
materiality of the image and on its spiritual and contemplative aspects. The idea,
as Paleotti put it, was to ‘rise to meditation on invisible things from the significa-
tion and imitation of these visible things known to us’.24 Paleotti further maintained
that the form of an image helped the believer in his prayers and strengthened his
belief by offering a real reflection of a deity that helped him in his contemplation.
‘we take these images not as simple figures but as part of the act of representation,
which means that while we gaze upon the image with our corporal eyes, our mind
fixes on the thing represented and contained in it through the mode of representa-
tion.’25 In this passage, Paleotti raises a problem concerning the veneration of images
by distinguishing between what is seen in an image and what it represents. What a
believer sees is a human form that helps him venerate a divine entity. ‘For example’,
he wrote, ‘when we adore Christ without an image, we are adoring him according to
his proper mode of being, and when we adore him in the image, we adore him in his
20 ‘abbracciare la virtù, & fuggire il vitio’. Paleotti, Discorso, p. 250; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane
Images, p. 288.
21 ‘cosi il christiano che hà da mercantare il cielo in questa vita, deve havere perfetta cognitione di tutte le
cose nelle quali versa, & sapere quale sia buona, & quale migliore, & quale ottima, per appigliarsi alla suprema
piu che può.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 269; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 305.
22 ‘le pitture hanno da servire per libri a gl’idioti’. Paleotti, Discorso, p. 235; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and
Profane Images, p. 274. In other instances, Paleotti calls those who cannot read simply popolo. See Paleotti,
Discorso, p. 266 and p. 273; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 302 and p. 308. See also Sohm,
Style in the Art Theory of Early Modern Italy, p. 58.
23 Paleotti, Discorso, pp. 210–213; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, pp. 251–254.
24 ‘Et di questa maniera è stato sempre dalla antichità giudicato, che si possano & si debbano con tali
somiglianze proportionate a sensi nostri, per la debolezza di quelli, rappresentare le cose celesti, accioche
dalla significatione & imitatione di queste cose visibilia noi note, ascendessimo alla meditatione delle
invisibili.’ Paleotti, Discorso, pp. 89–90; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 131. See also
Pericolo, ‘Visualizing Appearance and Disappearance’, pp. 519–520.
25 ‘prendiamo noi esse imagini non come semplici figure, ma sotto questo atto di rappresentare; il che vuol
dire, che riguardando noi con gli occhi corporali nella imagine, lamente si fissa nella cosa rappresentata,
& contenuta in essa per modo di rapprestatione, & di quì nasce, che quel honore, che si conviene alla cosa
rappresentata, si potrà anchora misteriosamente tribuire alla imagine.’ Paleotti, Discorso, pp. 95–96; Paleotti,
Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 137.
representative, “imaged” being’. What the believer sees becomes important, even if
what he should venerate is a concept, a spiritual perception that the image reflects
and not the image itself. For Paleotti:
in adoring the sacred images of Christ, the Virgin, and the saints, we are adoring
Christ, the Virgin, and the saints represented in the images; and when we kneel
before their images, it amounts to kneeling before themselves, the act being gauged
entirely by the prototype.26
As it is difficult to comprehend divinity, a translation of what cannot be seen in real

life is needed, so that the most spiritual perceptions and celestial truths receive a
figural form—as sacred images.
Paleotti believed that the best way to create a religious painting was to imitate
nature. What is probably the most coherent expression of this idea appears in the
last chapter of his second book:
Commencing, then, with the first, we say that, painting being an art of imitation
that consists entirely in resembling natural or artificial or imaginary things from
life or truth, as we have stated elsewhere, it is necessary for whoever wants to
exercise it honourably to have entirely mastered the art known as design, which is
called by some the soul of painting and principal foundation of this art.27
In this long sentence, the writer not only stresses the essence of artistic creativity, but
also divides painting into three different categories: the natural, the artificial, and the
imaginary.28 Moreover, he makes an important distinction between truth and nature,
two concepts that do not always coexist in the context of religious perceptions. Ear-
lier in his book, he expressed his understanding that all types of knowledge exist and
should be used for the sake of true wisdom, quoting St. Augustine:29
26 ‘nello adorare dunque le sacre imagini di Christo, della vergine, & de’santi, adoriamo Christo, la vergine,
& i santi rappresentati nelle imagini; & quando ci inginocchiamo davanti le loro imagini, è quanto ci
inginocchiassimo davanti essi, misurando questo atto interamente dal prototypo.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 97;
27 ‘Cominciandosi dunque dal primo, diciamo che essendo la pittura arte d’imitatione, & che stà tutta nel
rassomigliare le cose naturali, o artificiali, o imaginarie al vivo, o al vero come altrove si è detto, è necessario
a chi vuole honoratamente essercitarla, possedere intieramente l’arte chiamata del disegno, che da alcuni è
detta l’anima della pittura, & fondamento principale di quest’arte.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 277; Paleotti, Discourse
on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 311.
28 Lomazzo, too, stressed the importance of a painter’s education in terms similar to Paleotti’s adherence
to the aspects of knowledge, nature, and truth. He specified entities that are true in Christian terms, yet are
not natural, such as God, angels, souls, demons, and the places where they exist, and he distinguished them
from what he called ‘science’. See Lomazzo, Idea del tempio della pittura, p. 33. For the English translation, see
Lomazzo, Idea of the Temple of Painting, pp. 70–71.
29 ‘Presupposto tutto questo ne segue, che potendo tutte le sciēze, le arti, & operationi humane servire in
qualche modo alla vera Sapienza.’ Paleotti, Discorso, pp. 128–129.
Ideology 67
We are to use this world, not enjoy it, so that, through that which was made, we
may discern the invisible things of God: the point is to apprehend eternal and spiri-
tual things out of corporeal and temporal ones. The things, therefore, to be enjoyed
are the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.30
Even the most sophisticated idea, according to Paleotti, can be explained in a natu-
ralistic manner with the help of the Holy Scripture and stories from the lives of the
saints. There is no need to find analogous stories from ancient tales or Roman fables,
he wrote, ‘because there is no lack of the best and most delightful subjects in sacred
and ecclesiastical history and in the lives of the saints’.31 A painter, he maintained, is
a mute theologian, who must teach as well as delight the viewers of his paintings.32
His stated purpose, as expressed at the beginning of his book and repeated time and
again, was to address the Christian law in rational terms. As he notes later: ‘We say
that the office of the painter is to imitate things in their natural state of being, purely
as the eyes of mortals behold them.’33 As Prodi argues, this statement follows Carlo
Sigonio (1523–1584) and Ulisse Aldrovandi (1522–1605), who were affiliated with the
University of Bologna. Both Sigonio and Aldovandi were in close contact with Pale-
otti, and shared the same views with regard to the importance of remaining rational
30 ‘utendum est hoc mundo, non fruendum: ut invisibilia Dei per ea que faeta sunt, intellecta con spiciantur:
hoc est ut de corporalibus temporalibusq rebus, aterna & spiritualia capiamus: res igitur quibus fruendum
est, pater, & filius, & spiritus sanctus est.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 128; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane
Images, p. 178. See also Boschloo, Annibale Carracci in Bologna, I, p. 127; Varriano, ‘Caravaggio and Violence’, pp.
318–319; Muraoka, The Path of Humility, pp. 111–118.
31 ‘Quanto piu dunque hoggi dovranno simili inventioni da noi tralasciarsi, che sendosi gia diffusa la luce
della verità evangelica, non habbiammo bisogno piu di tali favole o inventioni, non mancando ottimi soggetti
& dilettevoli, nelle historie sacre & ecclesiastiche, & nelle vite de’santi?’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 242; Paleotti,
Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 280. See also Paleotti, Discorso, p. 252; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred
and Profane Images, p. 289.
32 Paleotti, Discorso, pp. 274–275; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 309.
33 ‘diciamo che essendo l’officio del pittore l’imitare le cose nel naturale suo essere, & puramente come
si sono mostrate a gli occhi de’mortali.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 209; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane
Images, p. 250. See also Paleotti, Discorso, p. 235; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 274,
where Paleotti asks while discussing the grotesques: ‘If we take it for granted that the office of the painter
is to imitate things that are either true or verisimilar, who can doubt that to depict a man with the upper
limbs of a giant and a lower body that turns into a trunk or a stone; or to form candelabras with human
faces whose heads emit flames; or scallop shells spouting streams of water; or trees produced by serpents;
or the faces, busts, and legs of humans, lions, and fish, intertwined together or accompanied with trees
and rocks, without order or reason from nature; who, I say, can doubt that such pictures are repugnant
not only to the office of the painter but also to nature, to reason, and to all the books ever written by the
authors in any discipline?’ (‘Se l’officio del pittore è l’imitare cose vere o verisimili, chi dubita, che il pingere
un’huomo ch’habbia le membra superiori di gigante, & che poi riesca nelle inferiori in tronco, o sasso; overo
il formare candelieri con faccie d’huomini, che dal capo mandino siamme: overo conchili, che gettino fiumi
d’acque: o arbori prodotti da serpenti: o faccie, busti, gambe hora d’huomini, hora di leoni, hora di pesci
complicati insieme, o accompagnati con arbori, con sassi, senz’ordine & ragione di natura: chi dubita dico,
che tal pittura non solo è repugnante all’officio del pittore, ma ancora alla natura, alla ragione, & a quanti
libri hanno mai scritto gl’autori di qualonque facoltà?’)
in discussing sacred history.34 Both aimed for a profound investigation of sacred truth
based on evidence and facts. Sigonio, the historian of Greek and Roman antiquity,
focused, according to Prodi, on historical realities. In this context, Prodi attends to
Cardinal Gugliemo Sirleto’s critical response to Sigonio’s remark about the death of
St. Francis in Assisi. In his Historia Bononiensis (History of Bologna), Sigonio recount-
ed the facts regarding the saint’s death. Sirleto’s reaction to Sigonio’s account was
that he should have written about it more piously, maintaining that the saint ascend-
ed to heaven. Sigonio responded that he had witnesses who had seen the saint dead,
and that he knew of no one who had witnessed him migrating to heaven.35 Aldrovan-
di, the famed naturalist, claimed that the best way to the invisible was through the
visible, and that it was through nature that one could gain a better understanding of
the divine.36
Paleotti stressed the importance of remaining as close to nature as possible while
rendering sacred scenes. He also attended to the uncertainties concerning the New
Testament stories and the lives of the saints whose details are unknown:
Let the prudent reader therefore take note that there are some subjects that are
represented with various modes, forms, and inventions, since none of them contra-
dicts the information we have about the facts, and indeed each appears to rest on
some reasonable basis, although we do not know precisely what the truth was. So,
seeing that good and serious authors have supported either manner, and painters
are generally no more obligated to follow one than the other, we call these pictorial
subjects indifferent and uncertain [indifferenti et incerte] because as yet no sen-
tence has been passed on the precise way they should be painted, or which of the
various ways they are currently painted ought to prevail.37
Nevertheless, Paleotti argued, one should not exclude things made to convey a sense
of mystery. One should remain faithful to the goal of religiosity, even if what is ren-
dered is not religious in nature. A painter’s task is to imitate what is true, which does
34 Prodi, Il Cardinale Gabriele Paleotti (1522–1597), II, pp. 538–543. For the relationship between Paleotti and
Sigonio, see McCuaig, Carlo Sigonio, p. 65; Bartolucci, ‘Introduction’, p. xv. (On page xx, the author mentions
the connections between Paleotti and Aldrovandi.) See also Bonfait, ‘De Paleotti à G. B. Agucchi’, p. 86.
35 Prodi, ‘Introduction’, pp. 16–17. For Sigonio’s conflict with his censors and especially with Cardinal Sirleto
on matters of historical fact versus ecclesiastical needs, see McCuaig, Carlo Sigonio, pp. 254–257.
36 Prodi, ‘Introduction’, pp. 17–18. On Aldrovandi, see also Rocco, The Devout Hand, pp. 18–28.
37 ‘& perciò è bene, che il prudente lettore sappia che sono alcuni soggetti, che nel rappresentarli ricevono
varij modi, forme, & inventioni, essendo che nissuno d’essi contradice alla notitia che se n’ha; anzi ciascuno
di loro pare appoggiato a qualche ragione, se bene noi non sappiamo precisamente il vero. Onde vedendosi
che ne l’una & l’altra maniera, i buoni & gravi autori hanno consentito, & communemente i pittori non si sono
obligati piu all’una, che all’altra parte: però chiamiamo tali pitture indifferenti & incerte; poi che per anco non
è data la sentenza del modo preciso, con che si debbano formare: & tra varie maniere che si sogliono usare,
quale di loro debba prevalere.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 214; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, pp.
254–255.
Ideology 69
not always correspond to nature, and which is not always visible or sensible. In his
first book, Paleotti mentioned the separation between the celestial and the terrestri-
al realms in quoting a passage from St. Augustine. He acknowledged the construc-
tion of two cities ‘from the beginning of the world, one of God and the other of the
Devil, one celestial and the other terrestrial; Abel built the heavenly one, but Cain
the earthly one’.38 By using the figures of Abel, the ultimate victim, and of Cain, the
everlasting sinner, Paleotti distinguished not only between the two realms, but also
between their inhabitants—that is, between those who accept God and those who
deny him. Paleotti also cited from the first epistle of Paul to the Corinthians (XV:
39–40), pointing to the same kind of differentiation between celestial and terrestri-
al bodies.39 Each realm, according to St. Paul, should be defined individually when
explaining its substance and respective glory. What is clear in St. Paul’s epistle, which
may further elucidate Paleotti’s account, is the importance of the division between
the two realms for the sake of achieving a cosmic unity.
In a chapter offering guidance to the painter concerning the presentation of vices
and virtues, Paleotti defined truths that are unrealistic or unnatural yet comprehend-
ible and perceivable as ‘intelligible and invisible things that truly have real being but
are not subject to the senses’.40 The depiction of certain places or subjects, he added,
may be important and necessary, even if what is depicted is a vicious enemy of Chris-
tianity and does not represent something naturalistic. Examples include the mon-
sters mentioned in the Life of St. Anthony, which were believed to be real by such
important figures as St. Jerome; or the underworld, where Lucifer and his rebellious
followers reside.41 Addressing the depiction of vicious creatures and vicious deeds of
the kind performed in hell, Paleotti wrote:
In depicting the frightful prospect of the underworld and the punishment of the
damned in the eternal flames and the ferocity of the cruel demons, who will ever
be fully adequate to representing that? Now here the painter may be given free rein
to spread before us the darkness and the squalor, the torments and the anguish, the
loathing and the screaming, the desperation and the flames, and the eternity of all
the torments in as many ways as he likes, provided there is verisimilitude.42
38 ‘a principio mundi processerunt due Civitates, una Dei, altera Diaboli; una celestis, altera terrestris;
celestem adificat Abel, terrenam verò Cain’. Paleotti, Discorso, p. 46; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane
Images, pp. 91–92.
39 Paleotti, Discorso, p. 28; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 75.
40 ‘cose intelligibili & invisibili, che hanno veramente il loro essere reale, ma non però sottoposto al senso’.
Paleotti, Discorso, pp. 246–247; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 284.
42 ‘nel dipingere la spaventosa faccia dello inferno, & le pene de’ dannati alle fiamme eterne, & la ferocia
de crudelissimi demonij, chi sarà mai bastevole pienamente a rappresentarla? Hor quì si può dare campo
franco al pittore in quante maniere vuole, pur che verisimilmente, di stender & le tenebre, & lo squalore,
i tormenti, & le angoscie, gli odij, e le strida, le desperationi, & le fiamme, & la eternità di tutti i tormenti;
These subjects are important because they help to convince the believer to keep
away from vice. In depicting these subjects, Paleotti maintained, the painter should
be inventive, use his imagination, and employ the style most in keeping with his
own inclination. What Paleotti is advocating here is representation in a style that is
different from naturalism.
Was Paleotti attempting to define or impose a new stylistic theory? While his
choice of words should not be taken literally, his accentuation of the different atti-
tudes toward distinct types of knowledge—truth and nature—should not be over-
looked. Pamela Jones made this point in an article concerned with visual learning
processes and the acquisition of knowledge on three cognitive layers of understand-
ing, (or three levels of delight): the sensual, the rational, and the spiritual,43 which
can also be seen as a source of inspiration for the eclectic attitude evident in Bolog-
nese painting.
Although Paleotti does not directly claim that a painter should distinguish among
different styles in a single work of art, his stylistic divisions were clearly based on
the nature of the portrayed scenes. Moreover, he made an important distinction
between virtue and vice, relating virtue to reason and nature, while leaving his reader
to deduce that vice, by contrast, is unreasonable and unnatural:
We say, then, that the noun ‘virtue,’ according to the wise, signifies nothing oth-
er than an operative habit conforming to the norm of reason, inasmuch as, man
being rational by nature, his actions must be regulated by reason, whence they
are judged good when they are in conformity with it. And because virtue alone
causes man to live by the rectitude of reason, it follows that virtue alone renders a
man truly good. Conversely, vice denotes the habit with which one operates at vari-
ance with reason, which is why it is said to be contrary to man’s nature qua man,
because, he being rational by nature, to operate virtuously, while it does not spring
from the nature of the genus, nevertheless accords with species of man. Hence, to
però che questa non farà mai amplificatione, non potendosi ne con inchiostro, ne con colori, ne anco co’l
pensiero agguagliare la grandezza, & la infinità di tanto male.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 217; Paleotti, Discourse
on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 257. See also Prodi, Ricerche sulla teorica delle arti figurative nella Riforma
Cattolica, pp. 48–49, and especially note 93. In an article on Giulio Mancini’s perceptions of intellectual
process necessary for artistic creation, identification, and inventiveness, Frances Gage discussed Mancini’s
idea concerning the pictorial invention of visionary elements beyond sensual concepts of reality and
tangibility, such as God, soul, angels, and paradise. Mancini outlined what the perfect visible forms for such
figures should be—namely, ideas and objects that Gage identified in terms of perfect and delightful forms.
These, continues Gage, are to be found in Venetian painting, in Titian’s Assumption of 1518 in the form of
music-making angels, as well as in Annibale Carracci’s Angel Gabriel of 1595 (Chantilly, Musée Condé). See
Gage, ‘Invention, Wit and Melancholy’, p. 7.
43 Paleotti, Discorso, pp. 68–70; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 112; Jones, ‘Art Theory
as Ideology, pp. 128–129; see also Boschloo, Annibale Carracci in Bologna, I, p. 124; Jones, Altarpieces and Their
Viewers, p. 117; Schildgen, ‘Cardinal Paleotti and the Discorso’, p. 12; Muraoka, The Path of Humility, pp. 119–122.
Ideology 71
operate outside the order of reason will be to deviate from man’s nature, and that
is denominated [by] vice and sin.44
Given that virtue operates rationally and in a natural environment, vice belongs to
the opposite domain.
Paleotti maintained that virtue should be represented through beauty (bellezza)
and enchanted light (lumi), while vice should be represented through deformation
(diformità) and by means of an exaggerated darkness (tenebre). ‘It would be exceed-
ingly beneficial to human life’, he wrote,
if it were possible to express the true images of the virtues and vices so that the
beauty of the first and the deformity of the second could be imprinted more effec-
tively on our senses. But as we said already, no concept has hitherto been found
that can properly represent their greatness, so we therefore remind persons versed
in letters and studies that for the sake of the public good they ought to be the ones
assisting the industry of painters by coming up with the true rationale and mode
[modo] of figurally rendering these two teeming armies of virtues and vices, the
former begotten by the father of light and the latter by the prince of darkness.45
In the above passage, Paleotti draws a connection between what is depicted and the
style that should be used to depict it, concluding that the choice of different styles
should reflect the difference between the real and the unreal, as well as between
light and darkness.46 His distinction between two manners of representation is also
evident in his ideas about the veneration of saints, which are similar to those he
expressed concerning the visibility of the divine. In Book 2, Chapter 21, Paleotti
44 ‘Diciamo noi dunque, che il nome di virtù al detto de’savij non è altro che un habito operativo secondo la
norma della ragione; imperò che essendo l’huomo di natura sua ragionevole, debbonsi regolare le attioni sue
secondo la ragione, onde alhora si giudicano buone, quando a quella sono conformi, & perche sola è la virtù,
che fa vivere l’huomo secondo la rettitudine della ragione, di qui è, che sola è essa ancora che rende l’huomo
veramente buono. Per lo contrario, si chiama vitio quel habito con che si opera diversamente dalla ragione, &
però si dice essere contra la natura dell’huomo in quanto è huomo; perche sendo egli di natura ragionevole,
l’operare virtuosamente se bene non nasce dalla natura del genere, è però secondo la natura della specie
dell’huomo: onde l’operare fuori dell’ordine della ragione, sarà un deviare dalla natura dell’humo: il che si
domanda vitio, & peccato.’ Paleotti, Discorso, pp. 243–244; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images,
pp. 281–282.
45 ‘Seria certo cosa sopramodo giovevole alla vita humana, il potere esprimere le vere imagini delle virtù e
vitij, acciò che ne’sensi nostri piu efficacemente s’imprimesse la bellezza di quelle, e la diformità di questi; Ma
come di gia dicessimo, non si è trovato sin hora concetto che possa degnamente rappresentare la grandezza
loro; e però ricordiamo noi alla persone essercitate nelle lettere e studij, ch’ad essi toccaria per beneficio
publico di aiutare la industria de’ pittori, co’l ritrovare la vera ragione e modo di figurare acconciamente questi
due esserciti numerosi delle virtù e vitij, l’uno prodotto dal padre dei lumi, & l’altro dal prencipe delle tenebre.’
46 This notion of stylistic differentiation differs from Alberi’s notion of variety, which focused on gestures
and movements. See Alberti, On Painting, p. 74.
is clear about the importance of depicting a portrait as naturally as possible: ‘we

remind the painter that in executing portraits he should depart not a whit from truth,
following the rule of the historian, who narrates the facts as they happened, and not
the orator, who often amplifies and extenuates things.’47
In Chapter 23, which focuses on the portraits of saints, Paleotti made an important
distinction between saints whose unique features are known since we are in posses-
sion of their portraits (which he listed), and those who died without leaving any traces
of their likeness. He brought to the fore what he perceived as various types of evidence
for the existence of viable portraits, even though his list of known portraits is not prac-
tical for painters, because the proof he provides consists merely of verbal descriptions
that are tied to no visual sources. He mentioned John of Damascus, who wrote about
King Abgar of Edessa obtaining an image of Christ. Veronica’s volto santo is another
well-known portrait of Christ kept in San Pietro in Rome. The Virgin’s appearance
is also known thanks to the portrait of her made by St. Luke. Similarly, St. Gregory’s
image is known because, as John the Deacon wrote in his life of St. Gregory, the saint
found it important to provide his monks with his own effigy, wearing his priestly habit,
to help them in their devotion. John the Deacon also mentions that St. Chrysostom
kept a portrait of St. Paul where he could gaze at it while reading the epistles.
A second source of information concerning the true visage of certain saints is visions
and miracles. For example, knowledge of St. Peter’s and St. Paul’s appearances is based
on Emperor Constantine’s recognition of their portraits, which had appeared to him in
a vision. Another instance, recounted by John the Deacon, concerns a cleric who had
a vision of St. Andrew, whom he recognized since he had a portrait of the saint next to
his bed. St. Ambrose was visited by St. Paul, whom he similarly recognized due to the
saint’s resemblance to a portrait of him that he had seen. Still, wrote Paleotti, not all
the saints or the blessed are known through a real, natural portrait; in such cases, he
instructed, one should portray them as closely as possible to what they represent.
But saints should never, ever be portrayed with the faces of particular individuals,
or worldly folk, or someone whom others would recognize, because it not only
would be vain and utterly undignified to do so, the result would be like a king sit-
ting on his throne in majesty wearing the mask of some charlatan or other ignoble
person well known to the crowd as an entirely private individual, such that whoev-
er saw it would immediately start to laugh.48
47 ‘raccordiamo al pittore che egli nel fare ritratti, non si scosti punto dalla verità, servando in questo la
regola dell’historico che narra il fatto come è stato, & non dell’oratore che spesso amplifica & estenua le cose.’
48 ‘Ma in nessun modo mai siano ritratti con faccie de particolari, e di persone mondane, e da gli altri
conosciute: perche oltre l’essere cosa vana & indignissima, verrebbe a rassomigliare un Rè posto nel throno
della sua maestà con la maschera al viso d’un Cerettano, ò d’altra persona ignobile, e conosciuta dal volgo per
privatissima, tal che chi la riguardasse, subito si movesse a riso, oltre molt’altre inconvenienze, come al luogo
suo si dirà piu largamente.’ Paleotti, Discorso, p. 168; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 214.
Ideology 73
That these saints should not appear to resemble any particular individual did not
leave many possibilities for painters other than depicting an idealized figure.
Paleotti’s request must have been familiar to Agucchi, who made a similar request
of painters: ‘We do not wish to deny the proper praise to painters who paint excellent
portraits. True, the most perfect practice calls not for seeking to depict what the face
of Alexander or of Caeser might have been but rather for seeking to depict what a
king and a magnanimous and strong captain should be.’49
Paleotti’s utilitarian approach and distinction between depictions of vice and vir-
tue touched upon two major aspects of sixteenth-century art: the portrayal (ritrarre)
and the imitation (imitare) of a given scene.50 Yet rather than viewing the latter
option as a recreation of the scene that improved upon its mere portrayal, and thus
maintaining an aesthetic hierarchy, Paleotti referred to both as complementing one
another in a well-defined structural and ideological equilibrium.
Consequently, as one reads Paleotti’s book, one cannot help but notice that he does
not seem to have been interested in styles, and that his injunction was purely iconograph-
ical. Yet painters who were naturally concerned with stylistic matters, and who wanted to
adhere to his call, could have read his book and translated his ideas into their own terms by
relating them to the idea of stylistic diversity. They transformed his divisions between truth
and nature, between the earthly and the divine, between vice and virtue, and between the
different types of saints, into an eclectic method characterized by stylistic diversity.
Paleotti’s unique approach was followed by the Lateran canon and poet Gregorio
Comanini, whose 1591 Il Figino pointed toward a similar distinction,51 by putting the
following words into the mouth of the poet Stefano Guazzo:
You, Figino, used that image for your painting in the chapel of the Collegio de’ Dottori
in this city. The painting is of Lucifer under the feet of the angel Michael, and in order
to better express the greatness of satanic pride, you made that figure with robust mem-
bers, strong limbs, horrible aspect, black visage, shaggy hair, and horns on his forehead,
the lower half resembling a satyr. On the contrary, to make manifest the goodness and
strength of the combatant Michael, you have so tempered your style in forming his
image that, although he is delicate of aspect, he radiates a certain fierceness.52
This statement seems to be an attempt by Comanini to give concrete expression to

Paleotti’s theoretical stance regarding the different styles that should be incorporat-
ed into a single work of art, while attempting to distinguish between representations
of virtue and vice.
49 Dooley, Italy in the Baroque, p. 429.

50 See Boschloo, The Limits of Artistic Freedom, p. 11.
51 For Comanini’s utilitarian attitude, see also Blunt, Artistic Theory in Italy, pp. 131–132.
52 Comanini, The Figino, p. 33. For Figino’s eclectic approach, see also Turnure, ‘Ambrogio Figino’, especially
pp. 41–50.
Figure 5: Guido Reni, The Archangel St. Michael, 1635, Santa Maria della Concezione, Rome (Photo: Public domain
via Wikimedia Commons).
This same attitude is addressed once again in a letter that Guido Reni wrote to
Monsignor Massani, master of the household of Pope Urban VIII, regarding a com-
mission from the pope’s brother Antonio Barberini, Cardinal of Sant’Onofrio, for
a painting of The Archangel Saint Michael (Figure 5). In his letter, Reni mentions
the scene’s two main protagonists and his sources of inspiration. He seems to have
Ideology 75
in mind either Paleotti’s contrast between representations of vice and virtue or

Comanini’s remark stating that the archangel should appear refined while the devil,
by contrast, should have a horrible appearance and a black visage:
I should like to have had the brush of an angel or forms of paradise, to form the
archangel and to see him in heaven, but I was unable to ascend so high, and on
earth I sought them in vain. So I looked at the form that I established for myself
in my idea. The idea of ugliness is also to be found, but this I set forth in the devil
and leave it there, for I flee him even in thought and do not care to keep him in my
mind.53
On a more practical level, one may understand Paleotti’s and Comanini’s comments,
as well as Guido’s letter, as attempts to formulate a distinction between a style that
imitates nature and one that does not, as well as between light and dark. Paleotti was
not alone in his conscious attempt to differentiate between virtue and vice in stylistic
terms. He was followed by Gregorio Comanini, as well as by Guido Reni. Comanini
expressed his ideas in a book, while Reni articulated them in his letter, which was
published by Bellori in his 1672 vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni.
A Pictorial Manifest: Alliance between Disegno and Colore
A visual expression of an eclectic approach can be found in Guido Reni’s unique

depiction of disegno and colore embracing one another, in what can be perceived
as an elucidation or conceptualization of the art of painting. In this painting, Reni
expresses the equality between the two aspects of creativity as an ideal to be engaged.
In what follows, I will analyse Reni’s Alliance between Disegno and Colore (Figure 4)
from an eclectic perspective. For the sake of clarity, Reni’s painting will be contrasted
with a painting of the same subject by Guercino, Reni’s compatriot. These two Bolog-
nese painters were regarded by their contemporaries as rivals, as can be deduced, for
example, from Malvasia’s account, according to which Reni replied in anger when he
was compared to Guercino:
who was the more worthy, he or Guercino of Cento. ‘I am, Fathers,’ he quickly and
boldly replied, ‘and I could tell you the reasons in terms of art but you would not
53 ‘Vorrei haver havuto pennello Angelico, ò forme di Paradiso, per formare l’Arcangelo, & vederlo in Cielo, ma
io non hò potuto salir tant’alto, & in vano l’hò cercato in terra. Si che hò riguardato in quella forma che nell’Idea
mi sono stabilita. Si trova anche l’Idea della bruttezza, ma questa lascio di spiegare nel Demonio, perche lo
fuggo fin col pensiero nè mi curo di tenerlo à mente.’ The letter is quoted in Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et
architetti moderni, p. 6. For the English translation, see Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 59; Borea and
Gassparri, L’idea del Bello, cat. no. 14; Casali Pedrielli, ‘Saint Michael the Archangel’, exh. cat. no. 51.
understand them. Therefore these three simple reasons will do. First, because my
pictures sell better than his. I, in fact, taught him how to be paid well. Secondly,
because he fishes out my ideas and tries to work the way I do. I never followed his
way of doing things. On the contrary I’ve always kept my distance from him. Final-
ly, because all the other artists follow my style and not his.’54
Beyond the obvious jealousy and competition that Reni felt towards his Bolognese
compatriot, his response points to the relationship among painters, and above all,
between these two champions of Bolognese painting. In this section, the theoretical
approaches of both painters will be examined in relation to their personifications
of disegno and colore. Significantly, while each declared his allegiance to his chosen
method, both painters used more than one method in the course of their artistic
careers.
Paintings that focus on personifications of disegno and colore like those of Reni
and Guercino (Plate 2) offer a commentary about the art of painting itself, function-
ing as a self-reflexive platform for expressing one’s own artistic credo and an explicit
and consolidated artistic outlook. This ‘bringing together of Theory and Practice’ in
the context of Bolognese painting was discussed by Dempsey in his seminal 1977 book
on Annibale Carracci.55 That painters believed that their theoretical ideas should be
expressed in their paintings is stated, for example, in both Agucchi’s and Bellori’s
writings. Both men added to their stories an anecdote about the two Carracci broth-
ers and their different ways of explaining the classical statue of the Laocoön, with
Agostino’s verbal explanation followed by his younger brother’s illustrated response.
The two authors recount how Agostino was praising the statue of the Laocoön while
Annibale stood silently to the side. Agostino became critical of Annibale for not par-
ticipating in the discussion. Without uttering a single word, Annibale took a piece of
charcoal and drew the statue in a way that showed how knowledgeable he was about
it. Agostino was so surprised that he fell silent. According to Agucchi, Annibale then
said: ‘We painters have to speak with our hands.’ Or according to Bellori: ‘Poets paint
with words, painters speak with their works.’56
Agucchi’s anecdote, which was repeated by Bellori, points to the importance of
a painter being knowledgeable and educated. Annibale’s ability to study an ancient
artwork and to address it in such a way that would lead his brother to acknowledge
Annibale’s superiority over him shows that he did not limit himself to copying the
54 Cited in Morselli, ‘Bologna’, p. 152.

55 Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, p. 3.
56 Agucchi: ‘noi altri dipintori habbiamo da parlare con le mani.’ Bellori: ‘li poeti dipingono con le parole,
li pittori parlano con l’opera.’ For Agucchi, see Dooley, Italy in the Baroque, pp. 433–434; Dufresnoy, De Arte
Graphica, p. 349; Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni, p. 31; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern
Painters, pp. 76–77. See also Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, p. 10; Sohm, Style in the Art Theory of
Early Modern Italy, p. 51; Sohm, ‘Caravaggio’s Deaths’, p. 458.
Ideology 77
work, but was also critical of it. Agostino’s reaction shows Annibale’s ability not only
to adopt a style different from his own, but also to express his interpretation of it.
This approach combines an ability to learn, grasp, appreciate, and criticize a classical
artwork, while visually expressing one’s theoretical stance about it.
The ability that Agucchi and Bellori attributed to Annibale is also evident in Reni
and Guercino’s paintings of Disegno and Colore. Reni, described by Raffaella Morselli
as ‘the standard-bearer of artistic rebirth’, uses an eclectic approach that is manifest-
ed in the combination of two styles in a single work of art, for the sake of expressing
or advocating the equality between the two most important components of painting:
design and colour.57 Guercino expressed a different view, accepting the superiority of
disegno over colore. Although the two painters differ in their theoretical approaches,
with Reni expressing a non-assimilated eclectic method and Guercino using a sin-
gle unified style, they both share the same approach toward variety characteristic of
Bolognese painting. The oeuvre of both these painters is marked by non-assimilated
eclecticism—the use of more than one style in a single work of art.
Guido Reni was probably the Italian painter most celebrated during his own life-
time. Bellori praised him by stating that ‘Guido’s name was surely the lovely accom-
paniment of grace with which he tempered his colors, thereby making himself supe-
rior to everyone and obliging fame to pursue him with prizes and honors’.58 Malvasia
wrote that there was no collector, in Italy or beyond the Alps, who did not make an
effort to possess at least one of his paintings.59 He cited Minozzi who not only regard-
ed him as the Apelles of his time, but also wrote that Guido was ‘the Plato of the mute
poets, the Virgil of the draughtsmen, and the Aristotle of the painters.’60 His great
fame, which persisted to the end of the eighteenth century, probably accounts for the
copies of his paintings found even today in Roman antique shops.61
Sometime between 1620 and 1625, Reni completed the painting Alliance between
Disegno and Colore (Figure 4), in which two young figures, a male and a female, are
depicted expressing their love toward one another. The two figures are portrayed
from their waist up. The young man is holding a red pencil in his right hand, while
putting his left hand around the shoulders of the young woman beside him. The sheet
of paper under the pencil reveals that he has drawn nothing but a very fragile, short
red line. In her left hand, the beautiful young woman holds a palette in which colours
57 Morselli, ‘Bologna’, p. 146.

58 Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 347. Reni’s biography was not included in the 1672 version of
Bellori’s vite.
59 Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 30; Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni, p. 71.
60 ‘è il Platone de’ Poeti muti, il Vergilio de’ Dissegnanti, e l’Aristotile de’Pittori’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II,
p. 84. For the English translation, see Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni, p. 141.
61 Pepper claims that Reni’s reputation declined during the nineteenth century to the point that his
works were sold very cheaply. See Pepper, ‘Caravaggio and Guido Reni’, p. 325. The last copy I saw was that of
Cleopatra’s Suicide, in a shop named Antichità on Via Giulia in Rome, on July 2017.
are arranged in order, as well as several paintbrushes. Her right hand is placed on her
chest in a familiar gesture of love. The absence of a brush in her right hand and the
clean, orderly palette indicate that she, too, has yet to begin painting. The painting’s
two young protagonists bear a very serious expression on their faces as they look
at one another. Their colourful garments and the dark background do not allude to
a specific time or place, thus enhancing the focus on the relationship between the
two. At first glance, the alliance of a male personification of disegno and a female
personification of colore seems to symbolize the connection between the two main
components of a painting. The familiar mid-sixteenth-century paragone between
the adherence of central Italian painters to disegno (Vasari) and the Venetian prefer-
ence for colore (Dolce) is missing here.62 The two figures appear enamoured of one
another. The painter has rendered the masculine disegno and the feminine colore as a
couple, attesting to how these two artistic components were perceived by the paint-
er, and perhaps also by other painters of his time. Pietro Testa similarly wrote about
the two as a couple, pointing to Raphael as the painter who had combined them in
the most perfect way.63
The division between masculine disegno and feminine colore is a well-established
early modern paradigm that can be traced back to the fourteenth century. In his illu-
minating article on the gendered qualities of stylistic conceptions in early modern
artistic treatises, Philip Sohm argued that a preconceived apprehension led to a dis-
tinction, beginning in the late fourteenth century, between the masculine character
of design and the feminine traits of colour. Reason, proportion, symmetry, design,
planning, rule, order, stability, and good judgment were perceived as masculine,
whereas irrationality, charm (grazia, vaghezza), a certain something (non so che),
inconsistency, sensuality, imitation, and an artificiality manifested in a taste for pret-
ty colours were perceived as feminine. A man’s view was seen as being character-
ized by substance and intellect, while pleasure and delight were viewed as typical of
women. Sohm mentions both Guercino and Reni’s paintings in this context. ‘Reason
and proportion’, he writes,
62 The literature on the dichotomy between design and colour is extensive. Examples include Rosand,
Painting in Sixteenth-Century Venice, pp. 10–25; Poirier, ‘The Disegno-Colore Controversy Reconsidered’, pp.
52–80; Goldstein, ‘Rhetoric and Art History in the Italian Renaissance and Baroque’, pp. 648–649.
63 ‘E con voce alquanto rozzetta in vero, esschlamava lui haver pocho i colori adoperati perché vedeva
la Pittura esser femmina et il Disegnio maschio, e che volendosi unirsi spesso vediamo l’una parte e l’altra
talmente indebilitarsi che a pena si sostengono. E qui alsava gagliardamente contro quegli che tanto con i
colori cerchano dilettarne il senso e far servo il disegno a una vilissima feminella che chiamava la Pittura.
Vi erano molti del suo parere, [mancaro?] molti qui da descriversi, ma fu dal divino Raffaello, che con la
Pittura sotto il portico passeg[i]ava, fatto tacere mostrandoli col essperie[n]sa che poteva sensa questo suo
indebilimento unirsi sempre, ansi che disuniti potevano cadaveri nominarsi, il che fu dalla Pittura confermato.’
The reference is taken from Cropper, Ideal of Painting, pp. 252–253. See also p. 132.
Ideology 79
in particular were identified with disegno and required many manly things: knowl-
edge of anatomy and proportion, intensive study of ancient sculpture, an orderly
memory, an ability to create divine images just God the Father did. Color, on the
other hand, adhered to the surface of things and appealed to the senses and to
the ignorant. Coloring could not be taught by art or precept but was practiced by
instinct and natural talent.64
A more careful examination of Reni’s painting reveals that the two main protag-
onists are rendered differently, not only in terms of their gender, but also in terms
of the use of line and colour (Plate 3): The male contours are not delineated, but are
rather accentuated by a careful tonal gradation of colour from shade to light. The
female personification of colour, meanwhile, is depicted with a much more elaborat-
ed and distinctive line that circumscribes its different components. This distinction
is obvious in the depiction of the eyes.
The female figure’s bright and clearly delineated eyes stand out in great contrast to the
boy’s painterly eyes. Reni depicted the man’s eyes as if casting a shadow that creates a sfu-
mato effect and eliminates their linear contours, shaping them instead by means of a ton-
al transition. This same difference extends to the representation of the faces. This choice
is exceptional, as one would expect the personification of design to be depicted as a linear
figure, and the personification of colour to be depicted with much looser brushstrokes.
Reni’s painting demonstrates an awareness of the combination of styles, and
although his main idea was to deliver a message of unity, he makes a clear stylis-
tic distinction between his rendition of the male and female protagonists in order
to highlight the ideas of mutuality and equilibrium. He may have been inspired by
Sperone Speroni (1500–1588), a well-known humanist and writer, whose Dialogo
d’amore, written in 1537 and published in 1542, used the figure of Tullia d’Aragona to
communicate the idea that a lover acquires the characteristics of the one he loves, in
both body and soul. As she puts it, ‘The lover (as I believe) is really a portrait of the
thing he loves’.65 She explains that the two will eventually be united in a single work
of art, and that their alliance (marriage) symbolizes the process of artistic creation
that consolidates these two components into a single, unified whole.66 One may thus
64 Sohm, ‘Gendered Style’, p. 761, pp. 778–783, and p. 787. See also Rocco, The Devout Hand, pp. 16–17.
65 ‘L’amante (come a me pare) é propriamente un ritratto di quella cosa che egli ama.’ Speroni, Dialoghi, p.
23. There is an elaboration on p. 25: ‘L’amante in somma, si come amante, ch’egli è, è il ritratto della cosa ch’egli
ama: il quale amante puo essere persona d’intelletto, & costumi cosi perversi, che a guisa di tela mal unta, non
riceverà intera la dipintura d’Amore; o lei ricevuta, stranamente di diritta in torta tramuterà’. See also Pardo,
‘Artifice as seduction in Titian’, p. 57.
66 ‘Et oso dire, che si come il dipintore con colori, & coll’arte sua ritragge il sembiante dalla persona; & lo
specchio illustrato dal Sole, ritragge non solamente il sembiante, ma il movimento dello specchiato; cosi la
cosa, che si ama, con lo stile d’Amore nella faccia, & nel cuor dello amante, se, & ogni sua cosa, così dell’anima,
come del corpo, va ritraggendo.’ Speroni, Dialoghi, p. 23. ‘And I dare say that as the painter portrays the
person’s appearance with colors and with his artifice; and the mirror illuminated by the sun portrays not only
understand Reni’s use of different styles in his depiction of the two main protago-
nists as a way of emphasizing their love for one another, as well as their unity.
Reni’s subtle stylistic differentiation between the two main protagonists, namely
disegno and colore calls for further discussion. In his Dialogo della pittura or L’Aretino,
Lodovico Dolce distinguished between two stylistic approaches with regard to the
nude figure: the masculine or the delicate (muscoli o delicato).67 The author refers to
Samson as a figure that should be depicted in a solid masculine form, and to Gany-
mede as a figure that should be rendered in a soft, delicate style. In using both styles,
what should be taken into consideration is the difference between a young man and
an old one, a youth and a boy, a male and a female—that is, the criteria of sex, age,
social standing, and moral standing (good versus evil).
The atmosphere of love and the sympathetic exchange of qualities in Reni’s paint-
ing are reinforced by the differentiated styles that characterize the two protagonists.
Reni’s style was never considered to be masculine, yet his delicate manner enabled
him to distinguish stylistically between the two main figures in the painting while
maintaining his personal approach. His rendition is a manifestation of a theoretical
model that emphasizes the combination of two styles in a single painting, constitut-
ing a non-assimilated eclectic approach.
An examination of Guercino’s Disegno and Colore (Plate 2), by contrast, reveals a
different theoretical approach. Guercino stressed a traditional Vasarian model char-
acterized by the supremacy of design over colour. An examination of his painting
shows an emphasis on hierarchy that is missing in Reni’s more balanced composi-
tion. While Reni stressed the connection between design and colour as two equal
elements that enhance or embrace one another, Guercino emphasized the authority
of design, and adhered to a theoretical view of painting as the culmination of an
artistic process formulated at the stage of design. Colour is perceived as a translation,
transmission, or interpretation of what has already been achieved in the design.
Guercino’s interpretation of Disegno and Colore is recorded in the Libro dei conti as
bought by the Marquis Achile Albergato in 1657.68 It was intended for Prince Niccolò
Ludovisi. Malvasia dated the painting to 1656, quite late in Guercino’s life and more
than 30 years after Reni made his version of this theme. Guercino’s painting may
attest to a change in attitude and to the waning popularity of the eclectic approach so
evident in Reni’s disposition. This does not mean, however, that an eclectic approach
was no longer practiced, nor does it mean that Guercino himself did not produce
eclectic paintings, which will be discussed below.
the appearance, but the movement of the one mirrored; so the thing that is loved, by means of love’s stylus,
portrays itself and all that belongs to it, soul and body, in the lover’s face and in his heart.’ For the English
translation see Pardo, ‘Artifice as seduction in Titian’, p. 57.
67 Roskill, Dolce’s ‘Aretino’, pp. 140–141.
68 Ghelfi, Il libro dei conti, p. 176 and p. 177; Salerno, I dipinti del Guercino, p. 385; Turner, The Paintings of
Guercino, p. 736.
Ideology 81
In this painting, Guercino depicted disegno as an old man sitting at his table and
directing his gaze towards the drawing that he holds with both hands. Beside him sits
a young woman, colore, in front of an unfinished painting on an easel. Her head is
turned in contrapposto toward the old man’s drawing. She holds a paintbrush in her
right hand, and a palette and more paintbrushes in her left hand. To her left the view-
er sees an unfinished painting of a sleeping Cupid that corresponds to the drawing
in the old man’s hands. It is not her own idea that she is considering, but rather that
of the old and experienced disegno. The palette of this painting within a painting
is restrained, standing out in contrast to the figures of the old man and the young
woman. The homogeneity of the colours connects the outcome of the process to the
design in the hands of the old man. Guercino emphasizes the contemplative mental
activity of the old man, and the physical activity of the young woman. He makes
it clear that colore is copying the figure from the drawing, mediating between the
old disegno and the unfinished depiction of the sleeping Cupid. The old man raises
the drawing from the table, indicating that he has finished his work on the design,
since he holds the sheet of paper with both hands to examine it intently. The young
woman is still in the process of making the painting, turning her head back and forth
from her canvas to the drawing. As suggested by Philip Sohm, she is dependent on
instructions from the old man.69 Her role in the process is subordinated to that of
disegno—the true act of creation.
Guercino divided his painting into three equal parts, occupied by the old man, the
young woman, and the canvas. Both figures are placed inside a studio. Behind the
old man is a window, through which one may see a bit of a landscape and the sky.
The background is constructed according to another symmetrical rule; only a quarter
behind disegno is open landscape. What strikes the viewer most is the hierarchy of
creation, with the old, experienced male figure very much concentrated on his own
work. The personification of colore as a beautiful maiden engaged in copying appears
at his left side. The result of their joint project is reflected in the image of the sleeping
Cupid.
The extensive attention paid by modern scholars to Guercino’s draftsmanship
affirms that he was one of the most prolific draftsmen among seventeenth-century
Italian painters. According to Mahon and Nicholas Turner, Guercino was probably
the most diversified draftsman of his time.70 David Stone similarly contended that
the painter was ‘the most prolific Italian draftsman of the entire century’.71 The enor-
mous number of drawings easily leads one to assume, as did Mahon and Turner in
69 Sohm, ‘Gendered Style’, p. 800.

70 See Mahon and Turner, The Drawings of Guercino in the Collection of Her Majesty the Queen at Windsor
Castle, p. xvi.
71 Stone, Guercino: Master Draftsman, p. xix.
their seminal catalogue of Guercino’s drawings at Windsor Castle, that the artist was
always thinking with either pen or chalk in hand.72
Drawings account for a critical part of Guercino’s artistic output and testify to
the extent of his artistic creativity and to his extraordinary skill. Mahon, Turner, and
Stone have all acknowledged his unique approach, emphasizing that he did not con-
sider his drawings to be merely a practical tool for design, but rather an end in them-
selves. This can be seen in the many caricatures, landscapes, and everyday life scenes
that he composed during his long and productive career.
In his Disegno and Colore, Guercino expresses his ongoing principal that the artis-
tic, creative, and intellectual process is finalized at the stage of disegno. The old man
is depicted as a self-contained creative mechanism whose hands, thought, and gaze
are all occupied with the drawing. Colore and the act of painting are dependent on
the work of Disegno, representing the imitative stage. The female figure’s contrappos-
to emphasizes her technical role as someone who is transforming an original intel-
lectual idea into a substantive entity. The young, beautiful personification of Colour
forges a connection between the drawing and the canvas by gazing at the paper while
moving her right hand and holding a paintbrush out towards the painting.
Guercino’s decision to place the composition in a symmetrical, classical, frieze-
like setting is a visual expression of Paolo Pino and Lodovico Dolce’s descriptions of
the progression of a work of art from the emergence of an idea or a concept through
its visual interpretation to final constitution. As Pino wrote in his Dialogue: ‘The art
of painting imitates nature in its surface aspects; and to make you better understand
it, I shall divide it in three parts, in my own way: the first part shall be design, the
second invention, the third and last, colouring.’73 Dolce followed Pino, delineating a
similar perception:
72 Julian Brooks estimates that some 40 per cent of Guercino’s drawings have survived, an unusually large
number in comparison to the surviving drawings of other seventeenth-century artists. With the exception
of some very detailed and rich illustrations, most of his drawings helped Guercino explore a multiplicity
of ideas and clarify his artistic conceptions. Stone recognized different types of preparatory drawings and
divided them into six groups according to their function: (1) general compositional sketches, drawings that
show Guercino’s ideas regarding the overall conception of a given painting; (2) partial compositional sketches
that attempt to isolate different groups of figures and examine their interrelations; (3) primi pensieri (first
thoughts), meant to clarify different trends of thought as to how to approach a particular problem. (Stone
defines these as ‘vehicles for brainstorming’ and notes that for Guercino this kind of drawing would even
appear at a later stage of work on a specific painting.); (4) half-figures, in which the artist focused on details;
and (5, 6) drawings that Stone describes as heads and draperies. The common denominator among these six
groups is that they all had compositional and stylistic functions. Stone, Guercino: Master Draftsman, pp. xxi–
xxv; Brooks, Guercino Mind to Paper, pp. 1–12.
73 ‘L’arte della pittura é imitatrice della natura nelle cose superficiali, la qual per farvela meglio intendere,
dividerò in tre parti i modo mio, la prima parte farà disegno, la seconda inventione la terza & ultima il colorire.’
Pino, Dialogo di pittura, p. 15; Pardo, ‘Paolo Pino’s ‘Dialogo di Pittura’, p. 331. See also Rosand, Painting in
Sixteenth-Century Venice, p. 19.
Ideology 83
The whole sum of painting is, in my opinion, divided into three parts: invention,
design and coloring. The invention is the fable or history which the painter chooses
on his own or which others present him with, as material for the work he has to do.
The design is the form he uses to represent this material. And the coloring takes its
cue from the hues with which nature paints (for one can say as much) animate and
inanimate things in variegation.74
Holding the drawing with both his hands, the old man forms a closed circular com-
position, which alludes to the never-ending process of design. While the creative pro-
cess is constant, the production of a single work of art is finite. Guercino’s portrayal
of the two main figures emphasizes these two aspects of creative activity, of which
the sleeping cupid is the passive outcome.
In his division of the composition into three parts, Guercino was following the
traditional construction of a painting evident in the above-cited passage by Pino
and Dolce. Although Pino and Dolce’s instructions differ from those of Guercino,
he stressed the same three major components, and he concluded by repeating that
invention, design, and colouring, united in a single body, are called painting.75
There are many ways to read this painting. Guercino may have decided to approach
the theme of artistic creation with analogies taken from family life. One can inter-
pret the personification of Disegno as God the Father, who has created the Saviour
through the Madonna. As Sohm remarks, making the same familial analogy, the wom-
an in Guercino’s painting ‘cannot conceive without man’s intervention’.76 One can also
detect a religious allusion to the Holy Family, with the bearded man as St. Joseph and
the beautiful personification of Colore as the Madonna. The painted figure on the can-
vas can be taken as standing for the baby Jesus. This interpretation would reverse the
hierarchy, since Mary is clearly the holier figure in theological terms.
In order to stress the contrast between design and colour, Guercino not only used
the straightforward contrasts between male and female, old and young, contempla-
tive and active, but also positioned the two main characters in opposing postures,
which he used quite often in other paintings. One example of such a composition
is his Brera Abraham Casting out Hagar and Ishmael (Figure 6), dated 1657/8, where
Abraham stands between the contrasting poses of Sarah on the left and Hagar on the
right.
74 ‘Tutta la somma della Pittura a mio giudicio è divisa in tre parti: Inventione, Disegno, e Colorito. La
inventione è la favola, o historia, che’l Pittore si elegge da lui stesso, o gli è posta inanzi da altri per materia
di quello, che ha da operare. Il disegno è la forma, con che egli la rappresenta. Il colorito serve a quelle tinte,
con lequali la Natura dipinge (che cosi si puo dire) diversamente le cose animate & inanimate.’ Roskill, Dolce’s
‘Aretino’, pp. 116–117. Dolce was followed by Charles-Alphonse Dufresnoy, who emphasized the same process
in his 1668 De Arte Graphica.
75 Pino, Dialogo di pittura, p. 18; Pardo, ‘Paolo Pino’s “Dialogo di Pittura”, p. 341.
76 Sohm, ‘Gendered Style’, p. 787.
Figure 6: Guercino, Abraham Casting out Hagar and Ishmael, 1657/8, Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan (Photo: Pinacoteca
di Brera, Milano – Ministero per i beni e le attività culturali).
The dichotomy between design and the act of painting is clear. What seems to be
at the core of this painting relates to methodology—creating a work of art with an
emphasis on hierarchy of process, and the superiority of the first stage of design over
the second stage of transmission. To make this process even clearer, the painter left
the figure of the sleeping Cupid in the painting-within-the-painting unfinished. This
painting of the sleeping Cupid exemplifies Guercino’s perceptions about the process
of creation. The non-finito figure of Cupid, with his limited palette of colours domi-
nated by yellow, accentuates this methodological sequence.
Like Reni’s Alliance between Disegno and Colore, Guercino’s painting focused on
a theoretical perception relating to the art of painting. Reni’s eclectic composition
highlights the coming together of design and colour in order to produce a painting,
much like the coming together of two lovers in a romantic story. For the purpose of
underscoring their love, Reni depicted the one with features that are typical of the
other. Guercino, by contrast, emphasized a hierarchy, with design as a self-sustained
process of creativity, and colour as a copyist, a mediator transmitting an idea to the
canvas. The stylistic unity of the main protagonists in Guercino’s painting should be
compared to the non-finito figure of Cupid in the painting within the painting.
Ideology 85
Figure 7: Guercino, Self-Portrait before a Painting of ‘Amor Fedele’, 1655, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D. C.
(Photo: Patrons’ Permanent Fund Accession No.2005.13.1).
A year before producing the painting discussed above, in 1655, Guercino completed
his Self-Portrait before a Painting of “Amor Fedele” (Figure 7). According to Guercino’s
accounts book, this painting was created for the Venetian collector Giovanni Donato
Correggio.77 In this composition, Guercino portrayed himself in front of a painting of
77 Ghelfi, Il libro dei conti, p. 168; Turner, The Paintings of Guercino, p. 722.
Figure 8: Nicholas Poussin, Self-Portrait, 1650, Louvre, Paris (Photo: © RMN-Grand Palais (musée du Louvre) / Jean-
Gilles Berizzi).
Cupid holding a dog on a leash with his right hand, while his left hand holds his bow.
Guercino depicted himself as extremely well dressed, holding a paintbrush in his right
hand and carrying additional paintbrushes and a palette in his left hand. The clean shirt
and black cape make it clear that the painter did not represent himself in the process
of working, but rather portrayed himself in front of his finished work. At first glance,
Guercino’s self-representation seems to correspond to the similar ideas that one may
find in Nicholas Poussin’s Self-Portrait of 1650 (Figure 8), which was commissioned by
his patron and friend Paul Fréart de Chantelou just a few years before Guercino cre-
ated his own version.78 Poussin, like Guercino, is wearing fine clothes, and addresses
the viewer while standing in front of his paintings. In one of the paintings, Poussin
78 Carrier, Poussin’s Paintings, p. 12. See also Cropper and Dempsey, Nicolas Poussin, p. 183.
Ideology 87
depicted a figure that personifies art. An inscription on the right indicates that he is the
painter. In contrast to Guercino’s painting, Poussin’s self-portrait was thus interpreted
in the context of an ambitious painter’s intent to climb the social ladder.79
At first glance, the three prominent figures in Guercino’s painting—the painter,
Cupid, and the dog—seem to partake of the same narrative. The slight rotation of
the canvas depicting Cupid and the dog, which is not entirely parallel to the picture
plane of Guercino’s painting, causes its left-hand side to run parallel to the frame
of the entire painting, while its right-hand side recedes slightly on a diagonal into
the compositional space. The dark cliff behind Cupid almost merges with the dark
framed canvas behind Guercino’s own image. Although Guercino positioned the
painting of Cupid on an easel, which is discernible both above and below the canvas,
the stylistic unity of all three figures makes it difficult, at first sight, to notice that two
of them belong to a painting within the painting. Both the painter and Cupid look at
the viewer, while the dog turns its head toward Cupid. Other important elements in
the painting are the bow in Cupid’s left hand, the landscape against which Cupid and
his dog are rendered, and the small marble snake devouring its own tail that appears
in the lower left corner of the painting within the painting.80
A comparison between Guercino’s Disegno and Colore and his Self-Portrait before
a Painting of ‘Amor Fedele’ may deepen our understanding of Disegno and Colore. In
his self-portrait, Guercino holds the brushes and the palette in the same position as
the allegorical figure of Colore. Both figures, moreover, are positioned in contrappos-
to, looking away from the painting. Guercino turns his head toward the viewer, his
gaze echoing that of Cupid in the painting he has just completed. The young female
personification of Colore gazes upon the drawing in the hands of Disegno. Both seem
to be copying; Guercino has just completed copying his own image from nature, and
Colore is copying the image of Cupid from Disegno’s drawing.
In both works, Guercino depicted the same mythic boy as a protagonist of a paint-
ing that is part of a larger composition. The difference lies in the painting’s state of
completion. In the self-portrait, the image of Cupid seems finished, whereas in the
allegory his image is still in the making. The two paintings partake of the same cre-
ative process. They appear to belong to the same sequence, almost as if continuing
one another. The snake devouring his tail on the lower left corner of the painted can-
vas in the self-portrait may symbolize the never-ending process of creation, which is
also evident in the personification of Disegno holding his drawing with both hands.81
79 Unger, ‘The Pope, the Painter, and the Dynamics of Social Standing’, p. 283.
80 Shilpa Prasad elaborated on the importance and significance of perspective, as manifested in the
interrelationship between the entire composition and the painting within the painting. The presence of
Cupid with his bow and arrows, the dog, and especially the snake devouring its own tail, which is depicted
as if made of marble, signify eternal and faithful love. See Prasad, Guercino, pp. 31–38. See also Turner, The
Paintings of Guercino, pp. 28–29.
81 For the significance of the snake biting its nail as a symbol of eternity, see Prasad, Guercino, pp. 32–33.
What this painting has to add to our understanding of Guercino’s creative process is
that here it is the painter himself who is depicted as creating a work of art rather than
Disegno and Colore.
Reni and Guercino’s renditions of Disegno and Colore visually express two differ-
ent theoretical perceptions that received attention in Bolognese painting. From this
study’s perspective, it is important to note the acknowledgment of eclecticism in
Reni’s approach. Guercino’s painting, on the other hand, expresses a different under-
standing of design and colour and of the supremacy of the one over the other in
the creative process. Nevertheless, Reni’s theoretical approach was also practiced
by Guercino, as well as by other painters, when the idea of stylistic separation suit-
ed their message. Reni’s unique representation of the two central components of
pictorial creation as complementing one another gives expression to a theoretical
approach that first received attention in Bolognese painting beginning in the second
half of the sixteenth century.
Carlo Cesare Malvasia and the Assemblage of Styles
Paleotti’s Discorso intorno alle imagini sacre et profane provided painters with an
ideological foundation for distinguishing between layers of meanings, especially
between reality and truth. Artistic discourses of the sixteenth century, and especial-
ly Lomazzo’s description of Adam and Eve, directed the Bolognese painters head-
ed by the Carracci to find a stylistic solution to Paleotti’s demands. Reni’s Alliance
between Disegno and Colore articulated an artistic theory that privileged the formu-
lation of an eclectic method. An engagement with the use of more than one style
in a single work of art is also evident in Malvasia’s Felsina Pittrice, which not only
identified and praised this artistic device, but also searched for reasons for employ-
ing and identifying the use of more than one style in a single work of art, beyond
Paleotti’s religious concerns. The following two examples seem most appropriate for
illuminating his approach. First, in his description of the Palazzo Fava decoration,
Malvasia explained reasons why the entire decoration was made in two distinctive
styles. Second, in his account of the Lambertini chapel, Malvasia expressed his view
as to why Ludovico had decided to use two utterly different styles in his depiction
of St. Dominic and St. Francis, and in his adornment of the ceiling with a personi-
fication of charity. The aim here is to delineate Malvasia’s observations with regard
to Ludovico’s art and more specifically to his works for the Palazzo Fava and for
the Lambertini Chapel, for which Malvasia acknowledged Ludovico’s non-assimi-
lated eclectic choices and felt the need to explain them. Malvasia’s unique stylistic
interpretation will be compared with Bellori’s view. Given that both authors were
almost the same age (Malvasia was three years younger than Bellori), and that their
most important publications came out at almost the same time (Bellori’s Vite was
Ideology 89
published six years before Malvasia’s Felsina Pittrice), it seems worthwhile to focus
on their different approaches and terminology. This comparison intends to empha-
size Malvasia’s perception of Ludovico’s stylistic variety, which stands out in con-
trast to Bellori’s adherence to stylistic unity. Malvasia’s undeniable and unsurpassed
hero was Ludovico Carracci, whom he called ‘the Apelles of our age’, an assessment
far from Bellori’s view of Ludovico as merely dependent on Annibale’s talent and
guidance. Bellori did not publish a biography of Ludovico, and his observations
were made in his discussion of Annibale.82 According to Bellori, when Annibale left
for Rome, Agostino returned to making engravings, while ‘in Ludovico, the fine tal-
ent that he once had dwindled little by little’.83
Modern scholars agree that Malvasia’s Felsina Pittrice, first published in 1678, was
a reaction to Bellori’s Vite de’ pittori, scultori e architetti moderni, which had been
published in 1672. In addition to this inclusive survey, Malvasia was the author of two
other texts that are important for this study. In 1686, he published Le pitture di Bolo-
gna. His Il claustro di San Michele in Bosco di Bologna, dipinto dal Famoso Ludovico
Carracci e da altri eccellenti maestri usciti dalla sua scola came out after his death, in
1694. Malvasia dedicated himself to extolling the achievements of Bolognese paint-
ing, especially the Carracci and their famous and most successful followers.
Modern scholarship doubted Malvasia’s reliability and viewed him as promoting
an agenda that disrupted his capacity for objective judgment. He was regarded as a
manipulative writer who consciously distorted the truth for the sake of emphasizing
the artistic supremacy of Bolognese painting. His writings, scholars maintain, should
be read critically, taking into consideration his political objectives and his Bolognese
patriotism.84 Malvasia, wrote Donald Posner, ‘is marred by an almost obsessive local
patriotism and, therefore, by an uncritical championship of Annibale’s Bolognese, as
opposed to his Roman, period, and of Ludovico Carracci over Annibale, who in Mal-
vasia’s view “deserted” his native Bologna’.85 Malvasia, as already noted, was also com-
pared with Bellori. Today it is common knowledge among scholars that Agucchi’s
82 Janis Bell quotes Kenneth Donahue, who in his 1946 Marsyas article ‘The Ingenious Bellori’ mentioned
a letter from Prior Michel in Rome to the Abbé Nicaise, in which he informs him that Bellori is going to
include in his Lives the biographies of Ludovico, Albani, Guido, and Antonio Carracci, as well as Guercino,
Andrea Sacchi, and Carlo Maratta. Only two surviving copies of the biographies of Reni, Sacchi, and Maratta
are known today. The rest of the biographies have yet to be found. See Bell, ‘Introduction’, p. 12. See also
Montanari, ‘Introduction’, p. 17.
83 ‘& in Ludovico si rallentò à poco, à poco quel buon talento di prima’. Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et
architetti moderni, p. 27; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 75.
84 On Malvasia’s reliability, see Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 36, n. 38; Mahon, Il Guercino, pp.
2–9; Mahon, ‘Malvasia as a Source for Sources’, pp. 790–795; Cropper and Dempsey, ‘The State of Research’, pp.
499–502; Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, pp. 8–28; Goldstein, ‘Rhetoric and Art History in the Italian
Renaissance and Baroque’, p. 649; Perini, ‘Emilian Seicento Art Literature, pp. 41–47; Cropper, ‘Malvasia’s
Anti-Vasarian History of Art’, pp. 419–420. See also Gash, ‘Hannibal Carrats’, p. 241. For a detailed account of
Malvasia’s local patriotism, see Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, pp. 11–24.
85 Posner, Annibale Carracci, I, pp. vii–viii.
aesthetic theory formed the foundation for Bellori’s Idea.86 Throughout the twentieth
century, Bellori was considered one of the most important and influential art theore-
ticians of the seventeenth century. He was, Posner wrote,
an author of great intelligence and sensitivity, and his Lives of Modern Artists is
a milestone in the writing of art history. He had, however, a regrettably limited
knowledge of Annibale’s Bolognese activity, and, while he was a scrupulously hon-
est historian, his aesthetic bias led him to give rather disproportionate emphasis to
the ‘idealist’ or ‘proto-Poussinesque’ aspects of Annibale’s art.87
In contrast to the modern perceptions of Bellori’s theoretical perspective, Malvasia

was viewed as a subjective, falsifying, and unreliable historian. Yet as Janis Bell has
observed, Bellori was driven by his own classical agenda, fortified by political inter-
ests that brought about errors which were not always innocent.88 Recent scholarship
accepts Bellori’s texts to be as problematic as those written by Malvasia. The latter’s
reputation has improved mainly due to the current understanding that the reading
of such early modern accounts must be accompanied by a careful consideration of
their rhetoric descriptive manner. In reviewing Dempsey’s revised book on Annibale
Carracci, which was republished in 2002, Gail Feigenbaum summarized this approach
by warning art historians against the manipulations, distortions, and uncertainties
that can be found in the early biographies. According to Feigenbaum, ‘art historians
have not only been put on notice that the early biographies can no longer be combed
naively for “facts” and “information,” but they have also been given guidance in how
such texts operate as species of rhetoric’.89 For our purposes, what seem important
are Malvasia’s theoretical observations, rather than his historical accuracy. These
observations are a valuable asset in any attempt to understand seventeenth-century
Bolognese artistic preferences.
Writing in a highly educated and sophisticated manner, Malvasia expressed his
admiration for Ludovico by referring to his ability to use different styles according
to his needs, as well as to his knowledge of sixteenth-century treatises on art. In his
description of Ludovico’s merits, he distinguished between Ludovico’s ability to
combine styles, while adhering to Pino, Dolce, or Lomazzo’s definitions of what con-
stitutes great art. Ludovico, according to Malvasia, was a great painter because he
86 For the role of Agucchi in the formation of classical art theory and his contribution to Bellori, see Mahon,
Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 113–154; Pepper, Guido Reni, pp. 16–17; Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal
Fiction, p. 30; Hansmann, ‘Con modo nuovo li descrive: Bellori’s Descriptive Method’, pp. 225–226. On the
connection between Agucchi and Bellori, see also Cropper, Ideal of Painting, p. 150; Bell, ‘Introduction’, p. 36.
87 Posner, Annibale Carracci, I, p. viii.
88 Bell, ‘Introduction’, pp. 29–30. For Bellori’s intentions, see also Sohm, Style in the Art Theory of Early
Modern Italy, pp. 48–50; Raben, ‘Bellori’s Art’, pp. 131–133.
89 Feigenbaum, ‘Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style by Charles Dempsey’, n. p.
Ideology 91
acquired the virtuosity extolled by these three sixteenth-century writers, as well as

for his ability to produce paintings that kept the diversity of styles palpable. Lomazzo
was the most explicit among the three, advocating, as mentioned above, for a paint-
ing that combines the stylistic strengths of the great masters of the past. According
to Malvasia, Ludovico achieved the goal of creating the most beautiful and perfect
art in forming the ‘Helen of his deeply considered idea’, the most beautiful woman in
the classical world.90
Malvasia’s use of his predecessors’ vocabulary in praising Ludovico’s knowledge of
styles is also manifested in a conversation that he described between the three Car-
raccis: Agostino was raising doubts about their approach to painting, and Ludovico
assured him that their path was the right one. Annibale sided with Ludovico, remark-
ing: ‘If Correggio is so well loved, and Titian too, and yet their fame is so opposed to
that of Raphael, why shouldn’t we be appreciated, since we strike out on the path
blazed by all three of them?’91
In Malvasia’s writings, one can discern references to both the traditional method
of assimilated eclecticism and to non-assimilated eclecticism.92 The first method,
which involves picking, choosing, and assimilation, is expressed in the following
passage:
But the judicious daring of this inspired painter [Ludovico] encompassed more
than this, for he entertained the bold aim of adding to the most famous styles of
all the past masters anything further that might be desired as the ultimate per-
fection of the miracles they had already achieved—that is, to add the lovely col-
or of Correggio to the perfect measure and proportion of Raphael, and the great
90 Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, p. 212, n. 277.

91 ‘Se piace tanto il Coreggio, se tanto Tiziano, il nome de’quali fà contrasto a quello di Rafaelle, perche
piacer non dovrem’noi, che di tutti e trè la strada battiamo?’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 377. For the English
translation, see Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, pp. 115–116. See also Malvasia’s description of
Annibale’s Return of the Prodigal Son, now lost, where he describes the old man as inspired by Titian while the
rest of the figures are inspired by Correggio. See Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 387; Summerscale, Malvasia’s
Life of the Carracci, p. 137.
92 This assimilated tendency was followed by Filippo Baldinucci. In his 1681 Life of Ludovico Carracci, he
commented that the painter combined different styles, mentioning Bagnacavallo’s colours and Tibaldi’s
design. He also pointed out that the famous Florentine painter, Domenico Passignani, showed Ludovico
Andrea del Sarto’s paintings. Ludovico visited Parma, Mantua, and Venice and became acquainted with
the paintings of Correggio, Titian, Parmigianino, Giulio Romano, and Primaticcio. ‘Del Bagnacavallo cercò
il colorito, del Tibaldi il disegno: di poi portatosi a Firenze s’accostò al nostro celebre pittore Domenico
Passignani, sotto la cui guida studiò tutte l’opere d’Andrea del Sarto; quindi viaggiò a Parma, a Mantova, a
Venezia, e fece per così dire anatomia di quelle del Correggio, di Tiziano, del Parmigianino, di Giulio Romano e
del Primaticcio, onde tornatosene in patria, senza aver mai fino allora veduta Roma, già erasi fatto sì grande in
tutte le più belle qualità dell’arte, che ogni altro suo coetaneo, oltre al suo maestro stesso ne rimasero oscuri, e
quei medesimi, che fermatisi nella superficiale apparenza di sua tardità nei primi studi, furon soliti chiamarlo
col nome di giumento, ebbero a dire, essere egli riuscito un tal giumento, che colla sua pigra movenza aveva
saputo lasciarsi addietro ogni corridore più veloce.’ Baldinucci, Notizie dei professori del disegno, III, p. 303.
draftsmanship of Raphael to the lovely color of Correggio, to add the tenderness

of Titian to the well-founded mastery of Michelangelo, and the deep knowledge
of Michelangelo to the tenderness of Titian—in short by mixing all the particular
gifts of these and every other great painter to re-create and form out of them all
taken together the Helen of his deeply considered idea.93
The non-assimilated type of eclecticism is discernible in the passage quoted at the

beginning of this book, in which Malvasia is astonished by his own identification of
three distinct styles in the St. George altarpiece: ‘To view the Saint George altarpiece
in the church of San Gregorio, and to consider the three styles, each one so different
from the other, seen in the saint, the maiden, and the angels in the upper section, is
enough to drive one crazy.’
A comparison between these two types of eclectic descriptions reveals some
obvious differences. The main difference lies in what is being emphasized. In con-
trast to his statement that the painter’s sources of influence are the most important
masters of the past, in his account of the St. George altarpiece Malvasia mentions
no artistic predecessors or sources of influence, focusing exclusively on the use of
different styles in the work. In the common perception of eclecticism, different
components taken from different sources complement one another as they form
a unified whole. The emphasis in Malvasia’s account of the altarpiece, however, is
on the existence of different styles that retain their distinctiveness. The process of
stylistic unification is absent, and the various sources for Ludovico’s different styles
are not mentioned.
Malvasia’s marvelling about Ludovico’s ability to use different styles while pre-
serving the distinctiveness of each of them in his description of the St. George altar-
piece is different from his discussion of the use of four different styles (maniere) in
a single work of art, which he pointed out and described as a ‘mixtureʼ (misto) of
different sources.94
In another reference in the Felsina Pittrice, the biographer continues to express his
admiration for Ludovico by stating the painter’s objectives in using such a method: ‘He
[Ludovico] himself had ample opportunity to deploy all the styles of the greatest mas-
ters, especially since for each scene he could adopt the particular style that was most in
93 ‘Ma quì non termina il giudicioso rischio dell’animoso Pittore, quando ebbe anco ardire di aggiongere alle
più lodate maniere di tutti i passati Maestri ciò che in esse, per ultimo compimento de’loro dipinti miracoli,
poter bramarsi parera: cioè a dire alla giustezza di Rafaelle il bel colorito del Coreggio, e al fondamento del
Buonaroti la tenerezza di Tiziano, e alla tenerezza di Tiziano la intelligenza profonda del Buonaroti, confondo
insomma di questi, e d’ogni altro gran Pittore insieme le particolari doti, per comporne, e formarne poi di tutte
insieme l’Elena della studiata sua Idea.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 435; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the
Carracci, p. 212.
94 For the use of the word componimento, see Paleotti, Discorso, p. 36. For the term misto, see Loh, ‘New and
Improved’, p. 484.
Ideology 93
keeping with and most suited to the subject at hand.’95 One may understand from this
passage that Malvasia observed a correlation between subject and style. He states that
each particular style Ludovico used was consciously picked and meaningfully chosen in
accordance with what he was trying to convey. Malvasia seems to be explaining an addi-
tional aspect of Ludovico’s creativity, following upon Paleotti’s demand that painters
draw the eyes of the inexperienced to gaze at his paintings with the charm and
variety of the colors, now bright, now dark, now delicate, now rough, according to
the quality of the subjects, and through the diversity of embellishment, the attrac-
tiveness of the landscape where the place permits, and other beautiful inventions.96
The idea of adjusting a style to a theme appears in a letter by Giovanni Battista

Manzini, a Bolognese man of letters, to a certain Giuseppe da Piacenza (first pub-
lished in 1646). Manzini’s letter addressed the importance of stylistic compatibility
between the rendering of a figure and the depicted episode or narrative. Manzini
distinguished between representations of Hercules as a fighter who is about to kill
the Hydra, as in Guercino’s rendition of the scene, and representations of Hercules
in the company of Iole. He maintained that the rules of decorum required that the
hero be depicted in this rough style, and suggested (as already acknowledged by
Philip Sohm) a connection between subject and style.97 It is clear from his letter that
Manzini generally preferred the more robust style, which seemed to him closer to
nature than did a soft and delicate style.98
95 ‘gli somministrarono ampla occasione di valersi di tutte le maniere de’ sudetti Maestri più grandi,
applicando anche di più ciascuna di esse al suggetto a lei più confaccente, e proprio.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice,
I, pp. 435–436; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, p. 213. See also Christiansen, ‘A Late Masterpiece
by Ludovico Carracci’, p. 28. For the dating, see Mahon, ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition’, p. 272.
96 ‘onde con la vaghezza & con la diversità de’colori, hor chiari, hor scuri, hor delicati, hor rozi secondo la
qualità de soggetti, & con la diversità d’ornamenti, leggiadria de’paesi, dove il luogo comporta, & altre belle
inventioni, trahesse gli occhi de gl’imperiti a rimirarle’. Paleotti, Discorso, p. 278; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred
and Profane Images, p. 312.
97 Manzini, Delle lettere, pp. 134–140; Sohm, ‘Gendered Style’, p. 802.
98 Decorum, appropriateness, or compatibility is a central concept for the understanding of early modern
painting. In his discussion of the connection between painting and poetry, Rensselaer W. Lee writes: ‘In the
case of decorum (convenevolezza or decoro), a word to conjure with in the history of criticism, the painter
was admonished that in his art each age, each sex, each type of human being must display its representative
character, and he must be scrupulous in giving the appropriate physique, gesture, bearing, and facial
expression to each of his figures’ (Lee, Ut Pictura Poesis, p. 35). Although this is a rather general definition
of the term, it stresses its connection to early modern artistic criticism. Francis Ames-Lewis adds to Lee’s
definition the didactic and moral dimension of decorum: ‘In later 16th-century criticism, these ideas of
representational propriety take on a more didactic, moralising tone, so that decorum could mean “not only
the suitable representation of typical aspects of human life, but also specific conformity to what is decent and
proper in taste, and even more in morality and religion”’ (Ames-Lewis and Bednarek, Decorum in Renaissance
Narrative Art, p. 9). The idea of compatibility between style and subject is addressed in the writings of Alberti,
Leonardo da Vinci, Armenini, and Mancini. Alberti writes about the compatibility in terms of age, gesture,
facial expression, social standing, gender, and cloths. Leonardo adds the compatibility of action, movement,
Malvasia’s acknowledgment of Ludovico’s ability to produce paintings in differ-

ent styles might be seen today as a Mannerist observation. It sounds closer to the
aesthetic viewpoint of Lomazzo, whose 1584 and 1590 books—published almost a
century before Malvasia’s—advocated a pluralistic study of different styles before
committing oneself to the one that best suits one’s inclination. Yet Malvasia, a con-
temporary of Bellori, is very different from Lomazzo in that his Ludovico not only
learned from many painters, but was also able to consolidate several styles that are
considered his own, and use each of them in conjunction with the subject he was
asked to render. Ludovico’s different styles were professional tools in the service
of the message he sought to convey. Malvasia thus acknowledged what should be
regarded as an important contribution of the Bolognese school of painting to the art
world of the period—non-assimilated eclecticism. What is unclear from Malvasia’s
descriptions is whether the combination of different styles employed by Ludovico in
a single painting was invented by Ludovico himself.99 Malvasia points to the use of
different styles in a single painting, with each style maintaining its own characteris-
tics and being separately identifiable. In the St. George passage, a different attitude
towards eclecticism emerged: yes to picking and choosing, and nay to assimilation.
In Le pitture di Bologna, Malvasia returned to elaborate further on Ludovico’s St.
George altarpiece, relating specifically to the different styles of the maiden, the drag-
on, and the archangel Michael. He marvelled at the depiction of the maiden in the
style of Parmigianino, and emphasized her suave and gentle appearance. He also
focused on the dragon, which is horrifying and earthly, in contrast to the archangel
Michael, whom he described as spiritual and graceful.100 This description highlights
and cloths. Armenini in the sixteenth century and Giulio Mancini in the seventeenth century both made an
important observation about the significance of the compatibility between subject and location. See Alberti,
On Painting, p. 74; da Vinci, A Treatise on Painting, p. 74; Armenini, On the True Precepts of the Art of Painting,
pp. 215–217; Mancini, Considerazioni sulla pittura, pp. 141–144.
99 A few words are required here concerning the idea that different subjects require different treatments, as
expressed by Nicholas Poussin. The term mode, or module, was first used by the French-born painter, who lived
and died in Rome, in a letter he wrote on 24 November 1647 to his patron and friend Paul Fréart Chantelou. The
letter is rather vague, and the ideas Poussin was trying to convey have received varied interpretations. The painter
wrote about classical Greek modes, proportions, and structures that should and could be applied in artistic
creation. Later in the seventeenth century, the ideas in the letter were repeated by Charles Le Brun and André
Félibien. Poussin’s source of inspiration was taken from music (most scholars attribute it to Gioseffo Zarlino’s
Instituzioni Harmoniche), and was related to different scales, or proportions, which are measurable, as well as to
movements and coloration that are immeasurable and fixed according to a preconceived hierarchy. Yet, as Le Brun
added in a lecture delivered in Paris a few years after Poussin’s death in 1668, the term mode also related to subject
matter. According to Naomi Joy Barker, Le Brun pointed out that ‘each mode was suited to a particular subject, and
had its own rules and could not be confused with another.’ In any case, this method or theory did not relate to the
mixture or combination of styles that characterize Bolognese eclecticism at the turn of the seventeenth century.
See Mahon, ‘Poussiniana’, pp. 122–128; Blunt, Nicholas Poussin, pp. 225–227; Montagu, ‘The Theory of the Musical
Modes’, pp. 233–248; Barker, ‘“Diverse Passions”’, pp. 5–24. For the quote, see Barker, ‘“Diverse Passions”’, p. 5.
100 ‘Grimaldi, spaventa insieme e consola la terribile sagma dello sfiancheggiante S. Giorgio di Lodovico,
del più orribil drago che mai s’ immaginasse tetra idea, e la più soave e gentil Regina che mai per mano del
Parmigiano Rafaellizasse. Al drago terreno, non cede sopra l’ Infernale, sconfitto dall’ Arcangelo Michele, dal
Ideology 95
the characterization of terms that Malvasia used to define what he called different
styles.
As noted above, an additional example of Malvasia’s acknowledgment of this
unique stylistic phenomenon and its resonance in his choice of words is his descrip-
tion of the Palazzo Fava decorations, which offers an eclectic methodological reading
significant for our discussion. When compared with Bellori’s description of the same
artwork, Malvasia’s non-conformist explanation reveals their different approaches
and underscores Malvasia’s adherence to what I refer to as non-assimilated eclecti-
cism. Bellori’s description of the Fava decorations highlights a different idea. His aim
was to emphasize Annibale’s unique achievements without considering the other
members of the family who participated in the project, namely Ludovico and Agos-
tino, so that he missed its overall eclectic dimension.
The entire cycle was the result of a collaboration between the three Carracci.101
Contemporary scholars are still struggling to attribute the individual paintings to the
different painters, and they find it even harder to attribute specific paintings to the
Carracci’s students. This problem is also present in other works of art that the Car-
racci completed on their own. Individuality of style, it seems, was not the goal of
the three painters when decorating the Fava rooms, nor was it a concern when they
established their well-known Accademia degli’ Incamminati.102 In writing about the
three, Agucchi referred to the problem of attribution as follows: ‘as far as the excel-
lence of their works was concerned, the connoisseurs could not discern even the
slightest difference among them.’103
The difficulty of attributing paintings to the individual Carracci painters is evi-
dent in Mahon’s ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition’ (1957). Mahon summed
up his personal insights about the paintings upon observing them together for the
first time in the same location, an occasion that provided him with the opportunity
to scrutinize the stylistic development of the three painters. His immediate response
related to the problem of differentiating between their works: ‘Thirty-six paintings
quale sugono così spirito samente I Demoni, tanto ben disegnati e graziosamente risentiti. Della tremenda
maestà del Dio Padre nell’ ornato, non si può dire a bastanza, e si confonde ogni più animosa lode.’ Malvasia,
Le pitture di Bologna, p. 114.
101 At the outset of their collaboration, the three Carracci painters tried to adopt a unified style, as Stendhal
(Écoles Italiennes de peinture, III, p. 16), for example, acknowledged in the Palazzo Magnani decoration, where a
similar collaboration is evident. Yet as de Grazia stressed, each of the three eventually developed differently, as
evidenced by Annibale’s idealized classicism, Ludovico’s forceful dramatic manner, and Agostino’s formalized
and rigid style (which revealed his return to a more Mannerist attitude). Even while absorbing into their art
similar approaches and similar natural elements, their styles remained different. See De Grazia, ‘Drawings as
Means to an End’, pp. 165–182.
102 It is worth noting here Malvasia’s tale regarding the Carracci’s ritual of entering one another’s rooms
when one of them completed a painting. Malvasia wrote that they would knock on the door as if they were
strangers coming from out of town. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 378; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the
Carracci, p. 120.
103 Dooley, Italy in the Baroque, p. 431.
in the exhibition were catalogued as by Ludovico, to which, in the writer’s opinion,

should be added three listed under Annibale’s name, making thirty-nine in all.’104 In
his discussion of the drawings in the collection of the Crocker Art Museum (1984),
which are associated with the Carracci and their circle, Howard Seymour similar-
ly addressed the problems of attribution and classification concerning the Carracci
school of painting. Seymour distinguished among three groups associated with the
school: the Carracci themselves, their immediate students, and later copyists.105 Even
the early collaboration at the Palazzo Fava, which was undertaken at the outset of
their careers, reveals the range of stylistic choices—what Stephen J. Campbell calls
‘heterogeneity of styles’—that made the Carracci reform in art so noteworthy.106 As
Campbell noted, Medea, for instance, is depicted once in the scene of The giving of
the Fleece in accordance with what the painter learned from Veronese, while in a sec-
ond scene, Medea’s Enchantments, she appears in a manner that corresponds to Cor-
reggio. For Campbell, ‘The radical shift in style between the clothed and the naked
Medea is, I would suggest, a signifier of more radical shifts in character, the moral
indeterminacy characteristic of the romance genre’.107 This shifting among different
styles continued to mark the unique approach of the Carracci throughout their lives.
The real difficulty concerning the attribution of individual works is thus rooted in
the fact that all three painters practiced in different styles, creating stylistic diversity
rather than unity.
Malvasia did distinguish between the works of the individual Carracci in the
Palazzo Fava when he pointed out that Annibale was responsible for the narrative
scenes, while Agostino created the statue-like figures situated in between the scenes.
Ludovico was in charge of the entire decorative scheme, and he retouched certain
areas when needed. According to their biographer, the three Carracci established
the entire concept of the decoration after Agostino admitted his ineptitude at using
colours and suggested the addition of intermediary figures between the narrative
scenes. He thought that they should add ‘on either side of the border of each picture
two deities that were appropriately and symbolically related to what was represented
inside the frame’.108 Eventually Agostino depicted these figures in chiaroscuro, lend-
ing them the appearance of statues. Their scale, black-and-white colours, and sculp-
tural appearance stand out in great contrast to the scenes from the story of Jason,
so that the entire set of decorative paintings appear to combine two different styles.
104 Mahon, ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition’, p. 194. See also pp. 198–199. For the difficulty involved
in attributing the Carracci artworks, see also Feigenbaum, ‘Drawing and Collaboration in the Carracci
Academy’, pp. 146–155.
105 Howard, ‘Carracci School of Drawings in Sacramento’, pp. 349–373.
106 Campbell, ‘The Carracci’, p. 211.
107 Campbell, ‘The Carracci’, p. 223.
108 ‘ogni quadro due Deita confaccenti, e simboliche ai soggetto ch’entro rappresentasi’. Malvasia, Felsina
Pittrice, I, pp. 368–369. For the English translation, see Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, p. 103.
Ideology 97
Figure 9: Annibale Carracci, Jason Carried in a Coffin to Cheiron’s Cave, 1583/4, Palazzo Fava, Bologna
(Photo: © Author).
Although Malvasia’s division of attribution is no longer accepted today, it is worth

noting his choice of words regarding the stylistic diversity of the Fava decorations
and the interrelationship between the two different sets of images, namely the
narrative scenes and the statue-like deities. Malvasia consistently addressed this
interrelationship in his description of the decorations, as revealed by the following
example.
In relating to what he addressed as the first scene, in which Jason is rescued from
King Pelias by hiding in a closed coffin that is carried out in a funeral procession in
the middle of the night (Figure 9), Malvasia stressed that the chiaroscuro figure of
Venus was placed beside this scene ‘because her planet was favourably positioned
at the zenith in its passage through the heavens at the moment of his birth, so that
she would feel obliged to guard and save him from the perils raised by his usurping
uncle’.109 What makes this description by Malvasia so important for our discussion is
that he interprets the images by attending to the combination of two different stylis-
tic choices—the narrative scene and the chiaroscuro figure.
When comparing Malvasia’s discussion with Bellori’s treatment of the same cycle,
the former’s unique approach becomes clear. After reminding his reader that the Fava
decorations include two friezes, one presenting the exploits of Jason and the other
the deeds of Aeneas, Bellori brought to the fore what he regarded as the best scenes,
which he assumed to be the work of Annibale. Although he mentioned the trompe
l’oeil pilasters created in chiaroscuro, he did not address the two groups of images
together. He did not explain how the chiaroscuro pieces fit into the overall composi-
tion, nor how they corresponded to the narrative scenes.110 Thus, the differentiation
of styles led Bellori to focus only on the narrative scenes. By contrast, Malvasia per-
ceived the Fava cycle as a unified scheme that included both the narrative scenes and
the chiaroscuro figures, and acknowledged the interrelation between both groups as
important for the understanding of the cycle.
Malvasia and Bellori differed in their aims, tastes, and approaches, and even in
their terminologies, as can be deduced from their own statements. In his preface to
the Felsina Pittrice, Malvasia stated that he was writing a book on native Bolognese
artists from the beginning of time until his own period, and that he was writing about
painters rather than about art. His intention was to delight rather than teach: ‘per
dilettare, non per insegnare’.111 Bellori, by contrast, wrote about art and the idea del
bello, a theoretical explanation of what constitutes good art. In this context, it is also
worth paying attention to how Malvasia described Ludovico’s work in the Lambertini
Chapel in the Church of San Domenico in Bologna, which further underscores his
eclectic approach.
Only three fragmented pieces from Ludovico’s decoration for the L ambertini
Chapel remain today in the Museo di San Domenico. As Feigenbaum notes, the fres-
coes were transferred to canvas when the chapel was remodelled in the eighteenth
century. The poor condition of the surviving fragments does not allow for an
impression of the chapel’s appearance during Malvasia’s time.112 What is e specially
significant for the current discussion, however, is Malvasia’s terminology, which
points to Ludovico’s eclectic combination of two opposing styles. Malvasia informed
his readers that the painter was commissioned to decorate the two lateral walls that
flank the altarpiece with images of St. Dominic and St. Francis, and to adorn the
109 ‘quella forse che nella di lui genitura in ascendente, ò mezzo Cielo ben posta, si sentì obbligata a guardarlo
da’ pericoli del Zio usurpatore, e salvarlo’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 369. For the English translation, see
Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, p. 103.
110 Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni, pp. 24–25; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters,
pp. 73–74.
111 Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, n. p.; Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice Lives of the Bolognese Painters, I, p. 186.
112 Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, cat. no. 20–21.
Ideology 99
ceiling with a personification of Charity. The altarpiece itself was commissioned

from a Florentine painter named Durante Alberti, and Ludovico did not know which
of ‘the two extremes of style’ would be chosen by this unfamiliar painter:
In the meantime, Ludovico did some shrewd thinking about the two extremes of
style which this out-of-towner would necessarily have to choose between for his
altarpiece—one the formidable [terribile], freely painted, and resolute, which
showed great things in only a few bold strokes of the brush and a few colors and was
appreciated by those with a knowledge of painting, the other the gentle, finished,
and lovingly attentive [amoroso], which appealed also to less enlightened viewers.113
In this passage, Malvasia delineates the same non-assimilated form of eclecticism

that is evident in his description of Ludovico’s St. George altarpiece. He describes
Ludovico as having decided to combine two styles, which Malvasia calls terribile and
amoroso, so that the painter would be able to compete with his rival in represent-
ing both extremes—forceful and graceful. The two flanking saints were depicted as
coloured statues dressed in ample swaths of cloth made of coarse wool. St. Dominic,
writes Malvasia, was terrifying. The figure of Charity, meanwhile, was made in a dif-
ferent style and was gentle, tender, noble, and beautiful.
In his description of the Lambertini Chapel, Malvasia adds another comment
concerning the use of an eclectic method, noting the painter’s deliberate decision
to use two distinct styles representing two stylistic extremes (estremi): terribile and
amoroso. Although Bellori never described that same set of decorations, it is worth
attempting to understand how he would have defined a stylistic extreme. In fact,
Bellori used the term estremi to emphasize the extremes of nature (naturale) and the
imagination (fantasia). Whereas Malvasia stressed Ludovico’s combination of both
styles in a single decorative program, Bellori referred to the two extremes to empha-
size Annibale’s unique middle-path approach.114 Annibale, for Bellori, saved art from
ruin by establishing a style that combined the best parts of nature with the best of
the great masters of the past. In him, Bellori found the most explicit expression of his
own artistic ideal. (It should be stressed here that Bellori is not suggesting a recon-
ciliation between two opposing styles as in the case of the nineteenth-century juste
milieu, but rather a third approach, as discussed above.)115 As already noted, Bellori’s
113 ‘L’accorto Lodovico intanto, riflettendo a i duoi estremi, ne’ quali potesse necessariamente dare questo
forestiere; ò in un terribile, facile, risoluto, che in pochi segni, e minori tente mostrasse gran cose, e piacesse
agli intendenti; ò in un gentile, finito, amoroso, ch’anche i men capaci fermasse, dell’uno e dell’altro modo si
valse e cercò, fosse per esser l’opra di quel Maestro ò fiera, ò graziosa, con un eccesso di fierezza, e di grazia
quella battere, e superare.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 380. For the English translation, see Summerscale,
Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, pp. 124–125. See also Stendhal, Écoles Italiennes de peinture, III, pp. 10–12.
114 Raben, ‘Bellori’s Art’, p. 136 and especially n. 47.
115 For a discussion on Bellori’s rhetoric in his introduction of Annibale Carracci, see also Hutson, Early
Modern Art Theory, pp. 148–149.
terminology seems closer in character to sixteenth-century theories of art, whereas

Malvasia’s terminology is reminiscent of Paleotti’s distinction between bellezza and
diformità, and between lumi and tenebre.
Malvasia’s acknowledgment of a non-assimilated eclectic approach in the Fava
and Lambertini sets of decorations adds to his understanding of eclecticism in his
description of the St. George altarpiece. He was not only enthusiastic about Ludovi-
co’s art, but also expressed his view as to the reasons for the use of more than one
style in both the Fava and the Lambertini cycles. In each case, he found a practical
reason that goes beyond Paleotti’s ideological stand. The combination of styles in
the Palazzo Fava, he argued, was a result of Agostino’s uneasiness about producing
coloured frescoes, whereas Ludovico’s use of different styles in the Lambertini Chap-
el was due to his lack of familiarity with the style of the Florentine painter who had
been commissioned to create the altarpiece. Malvasia also remarks upon Ludovico’s
ability to adjust his style in accordance with the subject at hand.
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3. Practice
Abstract
Chapter Three is devoted to the implementation of eclecticism in artistic practice. It
opens with an analysis of how the celestial and the terrestrial realms are represented
in different styles within the same composition. This analysis will be followed by the
examination of the differentiation between different types of saints—those whose
facial features are known, and those early saints who left no traces of their likeness.
This concern will be elaborated upon by attending closely to Reni’s portrayal of the
sixteenth-century St. Carlo Borromeo, in comparison to the portrayal of historically
earlier saints. The third part of this chapter will focus on other non-assimilated eclec-
tic paintings by this book four protagonists—Ludovico Carracci, Annibale Carracci,
Guido Reni, and Guercino.
Keywords: Terrestrial and celestial realms, St. Carlo Borromeo, Ludovico Carracci,
Annibale Carracci, Guido Reni, Guercino
In the following chapter, I consider several examples of non-assimilated eclecticism by

the four leading Bolognese painters—Ludovico, Annibale, Reni, and Guercino. These
paintings accord with Paleotti’s ideas as expressed in his Discorso, revealing these ideas
to have been, for the most part, stylistically applicable in practice. The first concern
addressed by these painters is the dialectic of the celestial and the terrestrial realms
and the distinction between virtue and vice. The second concern involves an emphasis
on the distinctive visual characteristics of saints whose likeness is known, and their
differentiation from saints about whose visual appearance we know nothing. Paleotti
demanded that painters depict saints in this second category as naturally as possible
without resembling a living person. Some of the paintings examined below were com-
mented on either by Malvasia or by modern scholars as containing more than one style.
In addition, I will examine a number of paintings that have never been considered in
this context yet are most revealing in terms of non-assimilated eclecticism.
It is important to note, however, that the use of an eclectic method in the paintings
discussed below by no means indicates that all the works produced by painters affil-
iated with the Bolognese school of painting can be designated as eclectic. Therefore,
the last section in this chapter will be devoted to eclectic attitudes discernible in other
Bolognese paintings that do not correspond directly to Paleotti’s religious ideas.
doi: 10.5117/9789462986015/ch03
The Terrestrial and Celestial Realms
Following Malvasia’s observation concerning Ludovico’s use of different styles in his

St. George altarpiece and the artist’s adaptation of style to subject, one may notice a
similar approach in additional paintings produced by the same artist. A good exam-
ple is Ludovico’s St. Jerome altarpiece of 1596/8 (Figure 10), which was commissioned
for the de Buoi family chapel in San Martino Maggiore in Bologna on 28 June 1592,
and has remained there since 1598.1 The rustically represented saint in this work
stands out in contrast to the delicate and graceful angels in the heavens, thus under-
scoring the divine inspiration that enabled St. Jerome to translate the Holy Scriptures
into Latin. It should be noted that the commissioning of this painting may well be
related to the publication of the revised Clementine edition of the Vulgate, which
appeared that same year (1592).2
The current location of Ludovico’s painting in the same church for which it was
designed in the sixteenth century allows for an interesting comparison with the adja-
cent altarpieces in the same church, especially with those completed by earlier paint-
ers in the sixteenth century. One such example is Lorenzo Costa’s 1506 Ascension
of the Madonna (Figure 11), which clearly depicts two distinct realms—a terrestrial
realm and a celestial one. As is typical of early sixteenth-century representations,
these two realms are depicted in a coherent and unified style. Cherubs surround the
Madonna in a mandorla, while two winged putti grip her knees. She is flanked by two
angels making gestures of faith—one crossing his hands, the other clasping them
together. Standing on the ground around the open sarcophagus are the apostles and
Mary Magdalene, who kneels before the open tomb while turning her gaze toward
the ascending Madonna. In contrast to Costa’s unity, Ludovico’s stylistic division is
accentuated in the contrast between his earthly, coarse St. Jerome and his heavenly,
classical angels in the sky, with each part rendered on a different scale and in differ-
ent colours.
Perhaps the clearest example among Ludovico Carracci’s paintings is his Virgin
Appearing to St. Hyacinth of 1594 (Plate 4). According to Malvasia, the painting was
commissioned in 1594 by the Turrini family for their chapel in the Bolognese church
of San Domenico.3 Ludovico depicted St. Hyacinth at the centre, kneeling with his
hands crossed in front of an altar and an inscribed plaque. A winged angel points at
the inscription, which reveals the saint’s identity. Above the altar, the Madonna and
Child are standing on a cloud. In the upper right corner are two angels, one of whom
1 For this painting’s provenance, see Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, cat. no. 51.
2 Since St. Jerome was perceived as working under divine inspiration, Ludovico’s iconography may certainly
be connected with the publication of the Clementine edition. See Rice, Saint Jerome in the Renaissance, pp.
187–189.
3 Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 484; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, p. 163, p. 248, and p. 262.
See also Mahon, ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition’, p. 201.
Practice 107
Figure 10: Ludovico Carracci, St. Jerome, 1596/8, San Martino Maggiore, Bologna (Photo: © Archivio Fotografico
del Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Fotofast).
is holding a violin. Visible beyond the Madonna and Child on the left is an entire
group of cherubs, which seem to be disappearing into a golden haze. Once again,
one can note how Ludovico emphasized the difference between the celestial and
terrestrial realms by representing them in distinct styles. While Hyacinth is depicted
realistically as a sunburnt mortal whose facial veins are about to explode, the heav-
enly Madonna is a serene young woman with a round face, almond-shaped eyes, and
a straight nose, and the baby’s beauty similarly conforms to the classical ideal. In
Figure 11: Lorenzo Costa, Ascension of the Madonna, 1506, San Martino Maggiore, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Practice 109
contrast to this robust celestial group, the thin saint (i magroni) is rendered, accord-
ing to Feigenbaum, as if ‘the flesh of the saint seems to consume itself’.4
In modern scholarship, the role of Ludovico Carracci in revolutionizing painting
has always been considered inferior to that of his younger cousin Annibale. While
Annibale made his mark in Rome, where he worked and lived for almost fifteen years
until his death in 1609, Ludovico remained in Bologna, coming to Rome for only a
very short visit in 1602.5 Nevertheless, scholars view his Madonna Appearing to St.
Hyacinth not only as a milestone in his own professional evolution, but also as an
important step in the development of early modern painting. In his ‘Afterthought on
the Carracci Exhibition’ (1957), Mahon considered this painting to be a transitional
work, while Feigenbaum observed that in this painting, Ludovico ‘established a per-
vasive paradigm for saintly visions in baroque art’.6
To the best of my knowledge, this painting has never been related to the concept
of eclecticism, although the differentiation of styles accentuates the painting’s idea,
since the dissonance between the main figures emphasizes the occurrence of a mir-
acle. The earthly Hyacinth, the Dominican friar known as ‘the apostle of the north’
because of his successful conversion to Catholicism of people in Sweden, Norway,
Denmark, Russia, and Poland, is seen experiencing a miracle, a vision in which the
celestial Madonna and Child appear before him. The timing of the painting was also
important—1594 was the year of Hyacinth’s canonization, and miracles remained an
indispensable aspect of sainthood.7
Malvasia dedicates a long passage to this painting, which demonstrates his recog-
nition of its uniqueness and importance:
Anyone who has not seen this picture cannot possibly imagine by what miraculous
process of thought Ludovico got it into his great head to paint in such a way that
every one of the finest painters would be made to look like a pygmy next to him:
next to him, painters like Giulio Romano, Tibaldi, or Fra Bartolomeo would seem
cramped and diminished; his use of color was so unusual and yet so marvelous as
to defy comparison, giving good grounds for maintaining and passing on the word
that something more convincing and remarkable, something going even over and
beyond Venetian coloring could be found there.8
4 Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, p. lxi.

5 Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, p. xlix; Christiansen, ‘A Late Masterpiece by Ludovico Carracci’, p. 22.
6 Mahon, ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition’, p. 201. Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, cat. no. 40.
7 Butler, The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Other Principal Saints, pp. 192–199.
8 ‘Chi non vede questo quadro, non sà qual sia la macchina d’un cervellone, che si cacciò in testa di
far’apparire, ch’ogni altro più gran Pittore presso di lui restatte un pigmeo: che un Giulio Romano, un Tibaldi,
un Frate di S. Marco appo di lui ristretti sembrino e diminuti: che questo colorire sia così fuor dell’uso, ma
così maraviglioso, che non si sappia a qual pareggiarlo, e s’abbia fondatamente a mormorare, e sostenere, che
In this passage, it seems Malvasia not only recognizes Ludovico’s great talent, but
also points to the emergence of a new style that surpasses the abilities of such great
artistic masters as Giulio Romano, Tibaldi, and Fra Bartolommeo, not to mention the
Venetian painters. As he continues:
Cignani reports having often heard his teacher Albani tell how one day when he
and Guido went to pay their respects to their master, and after greetings were
exchanged, Ludovico apologized for having nothing else finished to show them
apart from this large canvas, which had been turned to the wall and was now
brought forward into the light, at the unexpected sight of which he and Guido were
so surprised and stunned that for a good while they just stood there unable to utter
a single word, gazing at the huge canvas and exchanging glances with each other.
Guido eventually said that to see such a work was enough to cast every good artist
into despair and make him throw out his brushes and look for another profession.9
Offering more than a simple expression of enthusiasm, this anecdote represents the
writer’s reliance on two of the leading artists of the following generation—Albani and
Reni—in order to demonstrate the novelty of Ludovico’s work. Malvasia does not spec-
ify what had so astonished Albani and Reni about Ludovico’s painting; the answer to
this question may be found in his biography of Reni, in which he mentions two paint-
ings by Reni in which St. Hyacinth is depicted: an altarpiece for the Garisendi Chapel
in San Mattia, and a smaller painting that, according to Malvasia, was intended for the
Fioravanti family. For the altarpiece, Reni rendered the vision in which the Madonna
and Child appear before the saint. Malvasia wrote that Ludovico helped Reni by show-
ing him ‘the way to make the little cherubs so that the abundance and plumpness of
the flesh covered every projecting muscle’.10 In the second, smaller painting, the saint is
depicted together with St. Catherine in front of the Madonna and Child.
The altarpiece itself has been lost, but a modello for it is known and was published by
Stephen Pepper in his catalogue raisonné of Reni’s oeuvre.11 As this model reveals, Reni
used Ludovico’s composition, only in reverse. The saint on the left side kneels before the
Madonna and Child above an altar, which is placed on the right side. The main difference
oltre il tingere Vento, altro anche si trovi non men plausibile, e mirabile.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 400.
Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, p. 163.
9 ‘Racconta il Cignani aver più volte inteso dire all’ Albani suo Precettore, che andando egli un giorno
con Guido ariverire al com’in Maestro, dopo i soliti complimenti, scusandosi, non aver per allora altro
da mostrar loro di finito, facesse porre al lume questa gran tela, che stava volta al muro; e che in mirarla
d’improviso restarono così sorpresi, e stordici, che per buona pezza mirando il gran quadro, poi guardandosi
l’un l’altro, non poterono mai articolar voce, quando in fine disse Guido, che il vedere di simili fatture, era un
far disperare ogni galantuomo, buttar i pennelli, e pensare ad altro esercizio.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p.
400. Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, pp. 163–164.
10 Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 9; Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni, p. 42. See also Pepper, ‘The Virgin and
Child’, cat. no. 4.
11 Pepper, Guido Reni, cat. no. 8.
Practice 111
Figure 12: Guido Reni, Madonna and Child with St. Mary Magdalene and St. Hyacinth, Private Collection (Photo: ©
Archivio Fotografico del Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Matteuzzi).
between Ludovico’s and Reni’s compositions is that the latter depicted the saint with his
arms outstretched, while the former depicted St. Hyacinth with his arms crossed over his
chest. One more important similarity is the posture of the baby Jesus. In both paintings,
the baby’s head is tilted downwards in the same manner, indicating that Reni must have
seen Ludovico’s painting before making his own. Malvasia pointed out that Reni’s paint-
ing was completed when the painter was 23 years old. Therefore, Pepper concludes, the
painting was made in 1598, four years after Ludovico created his own version.
The Fioraventi painting (Figure 12) consists of four figures in a pyramidal
composition. The Madonna with the baby Jesus in her lap appears above the two
saints, who flank the Christ Child on both sides. The baby turns his head toward
Hyacinth while pointing his finger toward Catherine. Hyacinth is painted in a
conspicuously distinct manner in contrast to the other figures. The colours are
different, and the bold application of paint stands out in opposition to the delicate
Figure 13: Ludovico Carracci, The Madonna of the Scalzi, 1590/3, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Plate 1: Ludovico Carracci, St. Michael and St. George, 1595, Santi Gregorio e Siro, Bologna (Photo: © Archivio
Fotografico del Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Orselli).
Plate 2: Guercino, Disegno and Colore, 1656/7, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden (Photo: © bpk-Bildagentur).
Plate 3: Guido Reni, Alliance between Disegno and Colore (detail), 1620/5, Louvre, Paris (Photo: © Author).
Plate 4: Ludovico Carracci, The Madonna Appearing to St. Hyacinth, 1594, Louvre, Paris (Photo: © RMN-Grand Palais
(musée du Louvre) / image RMN-GP).
Plate 5: Guercino, St. Peter Standing before the Madonna, 1647, Louvre, Paris (Photo: © RMN-Grand Palais (musée
du Louvre) / Gérard Blot).
Plate 6: Guercino, St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in Purgatory (detail), 1647, San Paolo Maggiore,
Bologna (Two Angels pulling Souls from Purgatory) (Photo: © Author).
Plate 7: Guido Reni, Pietà dei Mendicanti, 1613/16, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna (Photo: © Archivio Fotografico
del Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Quattrone).
Plate 8: Annibale Carracci, Madonna and Child Enthroned with St. John the Baptist, St. John the Evangelist and
St. Catherine of Alexandria, 1593, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Practice 113
brushstrokes used to depict the other figures. This strategy of differentiation, which
is similar to that employed in Ludovico’s painting, is most obvious in the comparison
between the hands of the Madonna and those of St. Hyacinth, which are positioned
in close proximity to one another. Reni applied a wide variety of colours with bold
brushstrokes in order to paint the saint’s expressive hand. It contrasts greatly with
the Madonna’s delicate, pink-hued hand, which is painted with almost invisible
brushstrokes and characterized by a subtle diffusion of light.
Another example of this type of differentiation is Ludovico’s Madonna of the
Scalzi (Figure 13), which according to Malvasia was commissioned for the altar of the
Bentivoglio Chapel in the Madonna degli Scalzi church outside Bologna.12 The paint-
ing is exhibited today in the city’s Pinacoteca Nazionale. In his description of the
painting, Malvasia made it clear to his reader that it contained at least three different
styles, and described St. Jerome as appearing to have been inspired by Michelangelo’s
design and Correggio’s colour. Malvasia’s rhetoric followed the ideals expressed by
Lomazzo, which were discussed above. Yet he focuses his attention on St. Jerome and
the sources of influence for this figure, while attributing no such sources to the paint-
er’s depiction of St. Francis, and remarking only that he stands out among the other
figures in the painting, thus underscoring the difference between the two figures.
Malvasia also expressed his admiration for the Madonna, whose purity, grandeur,
and grace were depicted in a style unique to Ludovico. Once again, Malvasia empha-
sized the painter’s use of different styles in a single painting.13
Modern scholarship has also addressed the different sources of influence that can
be found in this painting; yet in contrast to Malvasia’s general attitude, this atten-
tion to stylistic diversity turned into an attempt to point to Ludovico’s sources of
influence. Ellis Waterhouse, for example, related the Madonna’s head to the style of
Veronese, the Child and St. Jerome to Correggio, the composition to the High Renais-
sance, and the space to Mannerism. To this list of sources, Feigenbaum added Rapha-
el and Tintoretto, as well as Dürer. Sydney Freedberg noted the difference between
St. Jerome, who seems more assertive, and the fragile Madonna and St. Francis. For
Freedberg, this painting is an example of Ludovico’s ‘adjusting style in each instance
to the nature of the subject dealt with’.14
Annibale Carracci’s use of different styles in order to distinguish between heaven
and earth is exemplified by his Three Marys at the Tomb (Figure 14) and his Pietà
(Figure 15). In both paintings, this distinction is evident in the diffusion of light,
which Dempsey viewed as Annibale’s most obvious reform in art. The Carracci
reform, according to Dempsey, related first and foremost to their adherence to nat-
ural forms, which was technically achieved through their approach to light. Light
12 For the commission and dating, see also Mahon, ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition’, p. 196 and p.
201; Bohn, Ludovico Carracci and the Art of Drawing, p. 172.
13 Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 383; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, pp. 128–129.
14 Freedberg, Circa 1600, p. 97.
Figure 14: Annibale Carracci, Three Marys at the Tomb, 1600, Hermitage, St. Petersburg (Photo: © The State Hermit-
age Museum. Photo by Pavel Demidov).
affects colour, since colours are in fact an outcome of reflected lights and their inten-
sity. The palette is keyed according to the scale of light, and the chiaroscuro occurs
within the range of the reflected light.15 Thus, if the scale of colours is controlled and
influenced by light, a painting containing two scales or two colour systems reveals a
combination of two styles.
In contrast to the three Marys, the angel depicted beside them on the same plane
is coloured on a brighter scale that is unrelated to his placement in the composition.
This distinct colouration represents a different reality. The three Marys on the ground
belong to the terrestrial realm, while the angel is not real. His heavenly disposition is
also marked by the corona. This discrepancy may explain the dissimilar use of white
in the dress of the angel and in that of the Mary positioned at the centre of the compo-
sition. This form of differentiation is a result of Annibale’s own stylistic development
15 Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 20–36. See especially pp. 33–34. For
Dempsey’s explanation of the role of nature in their art, see Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of
Baroque Style, pp. 50–51.
Practice 115
Figure 15: Annibale Carracci, Pietà, 1603, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (Photo: Kunsthistorisches Museum,
Vienna).
rather than a device borrowed from other sources of influence. In the second painting,
the Pietà, the Madonna and Jesus are coloured on a different scale than the two angels
just behind the Madonna. While the faint Madonna and the dead Christ are pale, the
celestial angels are yellowish and have pinkish cheeks. Once again, the same stylistic
difference is evident. Annibale used colour to accentuate the difference between the
two realms and the human nature of both the Madonna and Jesus.
There exist various accounts concerning the use of different styles in Reni’s work.
For instance, he is recorded as having been asked by Cavalier d’Arpino in Rome to
make a painting in the manner of Caravaggio for the sake of showing how easy it was
to emulate the latter’s style.16 Indeed, Guido was recognized by all his principal biog-
raphers as having gone through a Caravaggesque phase,17 yet this last point requires
further elaboration. Modern scholars chose to address Reni’s Caravaggesque period
in terms belonging to the twentieth century. Rather than delineating a continuous
progression of stylistic development, as in the cases of other early modern painters,
they described Reni as transitioning from one stylistic phase to another, in a man-
ner characteristic of modernist painters such as Picasso, Malevich, and Mondrian, to
mention only a few.
16 Friedlaender, ‘The Crucifixion of St. Peter’, p. 154.

17 For Reni’s Caravaggesque manner, see Pepper, ‘Caravaggio and Guido Reni’, pp. 325–338; Pepper, Guido
Reni, p. 23.
Figure 16: Guido Reni, Assumption of the Virgin with the Twelve Apostles, 1616/17, Sant’Ambrogio, Genoa (Photo:
After D. Stephen Pepper, Guido Reni: A Complete Catalogue of His Works, New York: New York University Press, 1984).
Practice 117
Much like Malvasia’s account of Ludovico Carracci, his account of Reni suggests
a painter who promoted eclecticism, as evident, for example, in his description of
Reni’s Assumption of the Virgin with the Twelve Apostles (1616/17) for San Ambrogio in
Genoa (Figure 16). Reni differentiated between the rendition of the apostles on the
ground and the Madonna ascending to heaven. The apostles are portrayed as dark-
er than the Madonna and the angels, and less finely depicted. Malvasia wrote that
before the painting was sent to Genoa it was exhibited in Bologna and was viewed
by all of the city’s great masters, including Ludovico, who was amazed by Reni’s
achievements. According to this account, the older painter supposedly declared, ‘Let
us agree that in this work he [Guido Reni] has surpassed himself. He will give pause
to all the others, because he knows how to work in many styles’.18
Malvasia also noted two different styles in Reni’s 1595 Coronation of the Virgin
(Bologna, Pinacoteca Nazionale). This time the biographer was very explicit in stat-
ing his sources of influence, observing that the first style, used to depict the heavenly
figures, was based on what the painter had learned from Denys Calvaert, while the
second style, used to depict the saints below, was borrowed from the Carracci. Ste-
phen Pepper writes that this differentiation of styles in Reni’s first public work was
intended to distinguish between the natural world and the heavenly realm, a strategy
that remained typical of Reni throughout his life.19
Malvasia’s impact on the perception of Reni by modern scholars extends to Water-
house, who similarly described one of Reni’s paintings using an eclectic terminology.
He differentiated between the dead Philistines on the ground, ‘shown with exem-
plary realism’, and Samson as ‘an ideal hero, conceived from classical sculpture,
whose pose, proportions and drapery are equally remote from any taint of realism’.20
According to Waterhouse, however, this stylistic distinction was not related to the
theme of the painting, but rather motivated by Reni’s preconceived aim to empha-
size the triumph of classicism over realism in the style of Caravaggio.
Another example of a painting by Reni, whose eclecticism was acknowledged
by modern scholars, is his Assumption of the Virgin (Parish Church, Pieve di Cento),
where once again the apostles are darker and less refined than the Madonna and
the angels above. Pepper drew a comparison between this painting and Annibale’s
Assumption in Santa Maria del Popolo in order to underscore the extent of Reni’s
18 ‘ch’egli in quest’opra hà superato se stesso, e darà che pensare ad ogn’altro, che sia per maneggiar più
pennelli’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 28; Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni, p. 67.
19 ‘For Reni, the two different aesthetics reflected distinctions of substance rather than style. Calvaert’s
polish and surface complexity better suited Reni’s concept of heavenly appearance, whereas the emphasis of
the Incamminati on the rendering of nature lent itself better to representing the concrete world of existence.
[…] Although obviously in this first work Calvaert’s influence is most apparent, the distinction between the
two continues throughout Reni’s career. His view of heaven is characterized by a diminutive scale, elegance
in drapery folds and gesture, and supernatural illumination. In this way, Reni conveys that for him heaven is a
realm not continuous with the natural world.’ Pepper, Guido Reni, p. 20.
20 Waterhouse, Italian Baroque Painting, p. 94.
Figure 17: Guido Reni, Madonna and Child with Beato Filippo Neri, 1614, Santa Maria in Vallicella (Chiesa Nuova),
Rome (Photo: After La regola e la fama: San Filippo Neri e l’Arte exh. cat., Milan: Electa, 1995).
Practice 119
distinction between heaven and earth: ‘there is an unbridgeable gulf between the
Apostles and the Virgin with her concourse of angels […] the Pieve Assumption, like
the S. Bernardo Coronation, displays a polarity between the naturalism of earth-
bound phenomena and the mysticism of the heavenly realm.’21 Yet while attending
to the use of more than one style in a single work of art, Pepper refrained from using
the term ‘eclecticism’. This choice is explained in his description of another painting
by Reni, Christ at the Column, which he explains as an attempt to combine a composi-
tion and lighting in the style of Caravaggio with a more refined rendition of the body
of Christ, which is typical of Reni’s own style. Pepper viewed this stylistic distinction
as characteristic of a transitional period preceding Reni’s most Caravaggesque paint-
ing, Crucifixion of St. Peter (Rome, Pinacoteca Vaticana).22
A last example is Reni’s Madonna and Child with Beato Filippo Neri (Figure 17), made
for Santa Maria in Vallicella (Chiesa Nuova) in Rome in 1614.23 In this painting, he depict-
ed the saint in a different style than the one used for the Madonna and Child surrounded
by cherubs. The use of white strokes of paint in Filippo Neri’s face and hands contrasts
with the smooth, yellowish tonal transition that forms the colour of the Madonna and
Child’s skin. Both the Madonna and Jesus look directly at the saint as Jesus blesses him.
Neri looks towards heaven, yet quite clearly, he does not see the Madonna. The painting
underscores this earthly figure’s spiritual ability to truly apprehend the heavenly realm
and become inspired by it, thus forging a connection between the two realms—an abil-
ity that defines him as a saint.24 Since this painting was created as an altarpiece for a
church associated with the saint, Reni’s motivation might have been to promote his can-
onization, which was actually approved a few years later in 1622.25
Guercino, who was born in Cento, is considered to be a Bolognese painter mainly
because of his affinity with the artistic orientation that emerged in the city. We do not
know when Guercino first came to Bologna. Giovanni Battista Passeri’s story about his
visit to the Carracci residence while he was still a boy, together with his immediate
enthrallment by their paintings, has no traces in historical documents, but is a good indi-
cation that he was already considered a Bolognese in the seventeenth century.26 Guerci-
no relied on the paintings by Ludovico Carracci that he saw in Cento, The Holy Family
with St. Francis and Donors (Figure 18) and The Conversion of St. Paul, and this align-
ment with Ludovico’s style was referred to by his seventeenth-century biographers.27
21 Pepper, Guido Reni, pp. 21–22.

22 Pepper, ‘Caravaggio and Guido Reni’, p. 327.
23 For the authenticity of both groups in the painting, see Pepper, Guido Reni, cat. no. 42.
24 The idea is that the saint is receiving divine inspiration and welcoming the Holy Ghost. See Treffers, ‘The
Art and Craft of Sainthood’, p. 359.
25 Angelini, Miracolo insigne, n. p.; Paolo Masini, Bologna Perlustrata, p. 6.
26 Passeri, Vite de’ pittori, scultori ed architetti, pp. 369–371.
27 The first to make this point unequivocally was Scannelli, who wrote that Guercino copied a work by
Carracci in the Capuchin church in Cento many times. Malvasia claimed that he heard the artist say that he
had learned two things from Ludovico in Cento: how to create a play of light and shade, and how to produce
Figure 18: Ludovico Carracci, Holy Family with Saints and Donors, 1591, Pinacoteca Civica, Cento (Photo: © A
rchivio
Fotografico del Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Villani).
Guercino’s status as a renowned and influential painter was acknowledged early on in

his career, and his works reached the collections of some major seventeenth-century
figures, among them Popes Gregory XV and Urban VIII; Cardinals Jacopo Serra, Ber-
nardino Spada, Richelieu and Jules Mazarin; Cosimo II, the Grand Duke of Tuscany;
and Ferdinando, the Duke of Mantua. Guercino’s choice to reside in Cento, rather than
in a large, central city, did not prevent him from becoming a sought-after painter, and
the colour effects that characterized his works. See Scannelli, Microcosmo della pittura, p. 361; Malvasia, Felsina
Pittrice, II, p. 360. See also Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 45–46.
Practice 121
his Bolognese contemporaries regarded him as an equal of Guido Reni.28 In 1642, he

finally moved to the city, living there until his death in 1666.
Among what are probably Guercino’s most important works are those completed
during the same period for different locations. These works thus addressed a variety
of themes and underscore Guercino’s stylistic diversity. Guercino’s two most import-
ant masterpieces in Rome are The Triumph of Aurora (1621, Casino Ludovisi), a myth-
ological painting composed in a single, unified style; and the Burial and Reception
into Heaven of St. Petronilla (1621/3, Pinacoteca Capitolina, Rome), a religious paint-
ing that exemplifies Guercino’s eclectic approach. The stylistically unified Aurora
gives expression to new trends in Roman art, including a great many foreshortened
figures hovering on clouds and illusionistic devices first introduced by Giovanni Lan-
franco, who was much in demand in the city at the time of Guercino’s stay there.29
The Burial and Reception into Heaven of St. Petronilla combines two styles in a man-
ner derived from Ludovico Carracci. Guercino depicted the final episode of the tale,
the burial of St. Petronilla to the astonishment of the young love-stricken Roman
officer, as well as her ascension to Heaven and her reception there by Jesus. The two
episodes are shown in two different parts of the painting, which are symbolic of the
celestial and terrestrial realms. Leo Steinberg viewed the use of the two styles as a
way of connecting the two realms, which are separated through the use of opposing
diagonals and different styles: ‘In the altarpiece, the otherness of the heavenly vision
is not conveyed by remoteness and separation, but by change of style.’30 Guercino
emphasized the difference between the mundane world and the heavenly realm by
depicting coarse, sunburnt figures and employing bold brushstrokes below, in con-
trast to the refined, fair figures and delicate brushstrokes above.
Two additional paintings by Guercino reveal his eclectic orientation and unique
way of delivering a message by using more than one style within a single composi-
tional frame. The first painting is St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in Pur-
gatory (Figure 19), in Bologna. The second is St. Peter Standing before the Madonna
(Plate 5) in the Louvre. Both paintings show his unique creative approach to repre-
senting the celestial and the terrestrial realms.
28 Passeri, Vite de’ pittori, scultori ed architetti, p. 379.

29 Guercino’s Triumph of Aurora is a stylistically distinct work. Modern scholars are in agreement concerning the
stylistic importance of the Casino Ludovisi works and their contribution to the development of Baroque painting. As
Donald Posner wrote: ‘Guercino’s daring Aurora on the ceiling of the Casino Ludovisi is closely related to the Ascension of
St. Peter that Lanfranco had designed for the Benediction Loggia, and it represents a further, indeed, a penultimate step
towardthecreationof theHighBaroque.’Posner,‘DomenichinoandLanfranco’,p.144.Ontheimportanceof thispainting,
see also Wood, ‘Visual Panegyric in Guercino’s Casino Ludovisi Frescoes’, p. 228; de Grazia, ‘Guercino as a Decorator’, p.
50. Posner points out that just before Guercino’s arrival in Rome, Lanfranco was occupied with the frescoes in the Sala
Regia of the Quirinale Palace. Later on he was busy creating his most important works in the Sacchetti Chapel in San
Giovanni dei Fiorentini (1623/4), a series of works in San Paolo fuori le Mura (1621/3), and the ceiling decoration of the
Villa Borghese (1624/5). See Posner, ‘Domenichino and Lanfranco’, pp. 141–144. See also Zirpolo, Ave Papa Ave Papabile,
pp. 37–38.
30 Steinberg, ‘Guercino’s Saint Petronilla’, p. 212.
Figure 19: Guercino, St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in Purgatory, 1647, San Paolo Maggiore, Bologna
(Photo: © Author).
Practice 123
Figure 20: Guercino, St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in Purgatory (detail), 1647, San Paolo Maggiore,
Bologna (St. Gregory the Great) (Photo: © Author).
Guercino’s St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in Purgatory is positioned
above the altar to the right of San Paolo Maggiore’s transept. The painting is recorded
in Guercino’s account book, which shows that the painter received a downpayment
on 21 December 1643 and a final payment on 22 October 1647. In both cases, the pay-
ment was made by a certain Leone di San Paolo.31 In this monumental canvas, the
saint is positioned on a cloud halfway between the Holy Father with the Madonna
31 Ghelfi, Il libro dei conti, p. 118, no. 299, and p. 135, no. 375; Turner, The Paintings of Guercino, p. 635, and p. 39.
and Christ positioned in Heaven above, and the personifications of the souls burn-
ing in Purgatory below. St. Gregory the Great is dressed in a beautiful and colourful
vestment, pointing toward Christ while looking down upon several suffering souls
(Figure 20). A white dove, which helps the viewer to identify the saint as Gregory the
Great, hovers beside his head. This painting, which depicts a scene far removed from
terrestrial reality, delivers a strong and important Catholic message, related to the
role of the saints as mediators between Heaven and Earth. The image of St. Gregory
liberating the souls represents a post-Tridentine idea that Guercino was one of the
first artists to formulate in paint.32 At first glance, it is unclear whether two winged
angels are pushing two personified souls into the fire or pulling them away from it.
That the action actually depicts pulling the souls out of Purgatory, rather than push-
ing them down, is clear when we consider the stylistic choices of the painter. Guer-
cino chose to portray the celestial group in a unified, classical manner that is char-
acterized by a subtle transition between colours and smoothly depicted skin. This is
evident in both the figure of Christ at the top of the composition and in the figures
of the angels at its centre. St. Gregory, by contrast, has a wrinkled face and neck,
and seems more earthly than any other figure in the painting. (One wonders if this
fact is related to Paleotti’s above-mentioned comment concerning John the Deacon,
who wrote that St. Gregory thought it important to leave his own effigy behind and
known, for the sake of helping believers in their devotion.)
Yet Guercino stressed another point through his differentiation of stylistic ele-
ments in the painting. The two souls that are being saved (Plate 6) are depicted with
classical features similar to those of the angels—oval faces, curly hair, almond eyes,
straight noses, and rosy cheeks. For Nicholas Turner, the members of this group ‘seem
like paper cut-outs lined up in the narrow space immediately behind the picture sur-
face’.33 They are carefully rendered with delicate brushstrokes, and are starkly different
from the souls remaining in Purgatory, most prominent among whom is an old man
looking upward with a surprised expression on his face. Two other figures are depict-
ed crying or drying their tears. The old man is a type often depicted by Guercino; he
resembles the figure of God the Father at the top of the composition, yet there is a
stylistic difference between the two figures. Despite his old age, God the Father is ren-
dered according to the same classical ideal of beauty that shapes the appearance of
other celestial figures, whereas the old man condemned to Purgatory is depicted with
bold brushstrokes, and his skin appears tanned by the sun. The colour used to portray
this figure is visibly different from that used to depict the angels and saved souls.
This subtle differentiation of styles may have been inspired by Ludovico’s painting
known as Paradise (Figure 21), which was made for the same church of San Paolo
Maggiore in Bologna. Here, three saints in the lower left corner are being inspired by
32 Samoggia, ‘Dottrina e devozione post-tridentina nella pittura del Guercino’, p. 83.

33 Turner, The Paintings of Guercino, p. 39.
Practice 125
Figure 21: Ludovico Carracci, Paradise, 1616, San Paolo Maggiore, Bologna (Photo: © Archivio Fotografico del Polo
Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Liverani).
angelic music that surrounds a ball of fire in the upper part of the composition, while
a shadowy figure at its centre has its arms crossed over its chest. This painting was
completed by 1 January 1617.34 Ludovico’s ‘luxuriant application of paint, and virtuoso
lighting effects’, to use Feigenbaum’s words, correspond to Paleotti’s call to empha-
size ‘resplendent light’. A marked difference in attitude separates the three saints
from the surrounding musicians and the secondary group of celestial beings affected
by the radiance of the ball of fire in the upper section of the painting.
In Guercino’s painting, the dichotomy between the heavens and what lies below
it is marked by clouds. In the heavenly realm, God the Father and his son look down-
ward toward the tortured souls while the Madonna seems to advocate for them, point-
ing towards them with her right hand while resting her left hand on her chest. A young
woman in the lower left corner and a young man in the lower right corner accentu-
ate the remorse felt by the entire group of souls. Beside the young woman is another
young man depicted in striking foreshortening, who is looking directly at the saint.
This is a highly sophisticated presentation of the concept of salvation, in which St.
Gregory plays a crucial role. The stylistic unity that dominates the upper part of the
composition is ruptured twice, first by the damned souls and then again by the image
of St. Gregory. The saint’s figure is highlighted by means of colourful drapes and a red
cape, as well as by his portrayal, which resembles neither the classical ideal nor the
appearance of the damned souls. Rather, he is realistically depicted with wrinkles and
dark skin, in contrast to the smooth faces and fair skin of the celestial figures and of
the two angels and saved souls (Plate 6). The white sleeves of the saint’s shirt were
painted with bold brushstrokes. The contrast between the beautiful cape and shirt
singles out the saint. The subtle depiction of the youth below and of the divine figures
above contrasts greatly with the strong, earthly colours used to depict the saint.35 The
use of more than one style thus accentuates St. Gregory’s role as a realistic, earthly
messenger of God, a mediator between the almighty and the believers who attend the
Church who is capable of saving the damned in accordance with eternal, divine law.
A unique expression of both the celestial and the terrestrial realms is evident
in Guercino’s St. Peter Standing before the Madonna (Plate 5), completed in 1647.36
Only two figures appear in the painting. St. Peter stands before the seated Madon-
na against a dark background, wiping his eyes with a handkerchief as he bows his
head slightly toward her. She looks at him with an expression full of compassion, and
appears to be listening to him attentively. She too holds a handkerchief in her folded
hands, which rest in her lap. The interlocked fingers indicate her total acceptance of
St. Peter’s words as she identifies with his pain.37 St. Peter, the humble fisherman, is
34 Perini, Gli scritti dei Carracci, p. 133.

35 For a discussion of ‘learned style’ versus ‘vulgar style’, see Sohm, Style in the Art Theory of Early Modern
Italy, p. 5.
37 On the meaning of interlocked fingers, see Barasch, Giotto and the Language of Gesture, p. 40.
Practice 127
rendered as an old man with a deeply furrowed face framed by dishevelled hair and
a beard. Rapid, rough brushstrokes are clearly discernible in the area of his neck. The
Madonna’s smooth face is that of a beautiful young woman whose features have yet
to be marked by the passage of time. In this painting, St. Peter embodies the temporal
aspects of life, while the Madonna represents the eternal ones.
We may take Lomazzo’s differentiation between old and young figures as a source
for Guercino’s combination of styles in contrasting old and young faces. ‘Hence the
sweetness of Jovian flesh’, wrote Lomazzo, ‘will be distinguished from that of an
old man, as the flesh of a person resting differs from that of a man pulling a weight
toward himself, or carrying a load, all bent over’.38 Rather than suggesting a change
of style for contrasting old and young faces, he merely offered a different attitude
towards facial expressions. Guercino emphasized a different stylistic approach with
a classical Madonna and a robust and coarse St. Peter.
St. Peter’s earthly figure, as noted by Luigi Samoggia, represents the humility and
human frailty of the individual. Mary, as an intermediate between the merciful God
and the individual, is there to lead the believer to salvation.39 The different styles used
by the painter to represent the two figures give the impression that each of the two
main protagonists exists in a different realm. The penitent St. Peter, who is confessing
his sins, is depicted as a corporeal, earthly figure, while Mary is a celestial and spiritual
one, whose halo alludes to her ascent to Heaven. That she is seated on the altar dis-
cernible to her right, before which the saint is praying so intently, could indicate that
he is imagining her presence as the ara coeli (the altar of Heaven).40 This impression
is enhanced by the Madonna’s representation with a halo, in contrast to St. Peter. The
significance of the halo in the representation of the Madonna and the lack of a corona
in the case of St. Peter are meaningful, especially since at the beginning of the seven-
teenth century it was a real issue to represent those who were not officially admitted
as saints by the church with a halo.41 As shown by Ruth S. Noyes, it was forbidden to
represent those who had not fully received official approval as saints with a nimbus.42
Although no one doubted Peter’s sainthood, the lack of a nimbus in this case was sig-
nificant. That St. Peter in Guercino’s painting is not represented as a saint underscores
the painter’s focus on a scene that represents him as a living person.
38 Lomazzo, Idea of the Temple of Painting, p. 124.

39 Samoggia, ‘Dottrina e devozione post-tridentina nella pittura del Guercino’, pp. 85–86.
40 For the Madonna as altar, see Askew, Caravaggio’s Death of the Virgin, pp. 122–125.
41 In Carlo Borromeo’s book Instructions on Ecclesiastical Building, the influential archbishop of Milan
expressed a decisive view on this matter. Writing about the emblems of saints, he noted that ‘in addition to the
images of the Saints, to express some sacred allusion, should be placed in apt and proper conformity with what
is ordained by the Church; as for example, the corona (nimbus) or crown, which is like a round shield, placed on
the heads of Saints; […] Attention must also be used that no coronæ (nimbi) be ever placed in the portrait of any
one but of those whom the Church has canonized’. Borromeo, Instructions on Ecclesiastical Building, pp. 61–62.
42 For the debate on this matter at the turn of the seventeenth century, see Noyes, ‘On the Fringes of Center’,
pp. 800–846. See especially pp. 812–815.
One could well interpret the image of the Madonna as a vision appearing to St.
Peter. He is weeping, and she, as revealed by the handkerchief she is holding, is
identifying with his pain. What Guercino is perhaps trying to stress is the heavenly
absolution bestowed upon St. Peter, since the theme of St. Peter as a penitent saint
enjoyed great popularity in seventeenth-century art.43 In this unique representation
of the penitent saint, the painter used an eclectic method to deliver the message.
As this discussion reveals, eclecticism is discernible in varied instances that com-
bine the depiction of the celestial and the terrestrial realms while maintaining their
distinct stylistic features. Once this differentiation is achieved, a painter may depict
both realms within the same space, as is evident in Annibale’s Three Marys at the
Tomb and in Guercino’s St. Peter Standing before the Madonna.
Portraits of Saints: St. Carlo Borromeo’s Effigy
In his Discorso, as discussed in Chapter Two, Paleotti made a distinction between the
portrayal of two different types of saints—those whose facial features were known,
and those whose appearance remained unknown. A painter, he argued, should por-
tray the known saints realistically, according to their actual appearance. By contrast,
saints whose distinctive features remained unknown should be portrayed in accor-
dance with the values they represented, and as closely as possible to nature. They
should be painted truthfully but not realistically, and should resemble no living indi-
vidual. This distinction between these two types of representations lends itself to
eclecticism, as made evident by paintings in which St. Carlo Borromeo (1538–1584),
who was elevated to the rank of saint at the beginning of the seventeenth century
(1610), was rendered together with other saints.
Reni’s Pietà dei Mendicanti (Plate 7), created for the Church of Santa Maria del-
la Pietà dei Mendicanti (1613/16) and today part of the collection of the Pinacote-
ca Nazionale di Bologna, is a good case study since in addition to Borromeo’s por-
trait it also includes representations of early saints, whose facial features remain
unknown.44 Reni, as suggested in Chapter Two, advocated for the use of more than a
single style in a given painting, so that the subject of this composition afforded him
an opportunity to practice eclecticism.45
43 Mâle, L’Art Religieux après le Concile de Trente, pp. 48–54; Unger, ‘For all have sinned, and come short of the
glory of God’, pp. 384–385.
44 For the circumstances surrounding the commission of Reni’s Pietà dei Mendicanti, see also Terpstra,
Cultures of Charity, p. 266.
45 Reni depicted the saint in two other paintings commissioned for Bolognese churches, as well as in
one painting used to adorn the façade of the Roman Church of the Barnabiti—San Carlo ai Catinari. Reni’s
Bolognese representations of the saint include a fresco of the Apotheosis of St. Carlo (1613), located in Santa
Maria dei Servi. In his 1787 The Gentleman’s Guide in his Tour through Italy, the botanist Thomas Martyn
described the painting as ‘S. Carlo, and his apotheosis, with boys holding the attributes of episcopacy’. This
Practice 129
Borromeo was the first to be canonized among the sixteenth-century clergymen

who were active in the struggle for reform within the Catholic Church and in the
conflict with the Protestants, and the timing of his canonization indicates his status
as a role model for a determined and strong Catholic clergy. He was an exceptional,
charismatic figure with a forceful personality, who never demanded of others any-
thing that he did not demand of himself.
More than any other clergyman in the post-Trent era, Borromeo was actively
involved in the Catholic Reformation. As the nephew of Pope Pius IV (1499–1564), he
was the dominant figure at the last session of the Council of Trent, and he dissemi-
nated its decisions together with his interpretation of them, which was the most rigid
and uncompromising of all those written at the time. Most significantly, during the
period in which he served as the archbishop of Milan, from the time of his uncle’s
death until his own death, he succeeded in dictating the city’s political-religious
agenda. After decades of religious influence by the city’s Spanish rulers, he succeed-
ed in surmounting their pressures and created two separate entities: a secular body
headed by Spain, which was still a strong power in the late sixteenth century, and
a religious body headed by the pope.46 By virtue of these accomplishments, he was
considered the Catholic standard-bearer of Tridentine reform, whose inspiration
would make it possible to realize the aspiration of Catholic unity and to defeat the
Protestants. The papal bull La Bolla della Canonizatione di San Carlo, which was pub-
lished in 1614 by Marco Aurelio Grattarola, indicates the extent of Borromeo’s popu-
larity during the first half of the seventeenth century, and the degree of appreciation
that he received as a worthy example of a determined, strong Catholic clergyman.47
This brief biography of the saint may serve as an indication of how important it
was for Catholics to capture his likeness in portraits that could be easily recognized
by all. Furthermore, Paleotti’s call for painters to depict saints according to their real
likeness was supported by Carlo Borromeo himself in his Instructions on Ecclesiastical
Building. Borromeo remarked that saints should be easily recognized and be depict-
ed in a distinctive and consistent manner without resembling any actual person:
painting was destroyed, and all that remains of it today is the saint’s half-length figure, which is foreshortened
upwards with his arms to his sides and the faces of two pairs of putti flanking him on either side. According
to Malvasia, a second painting by Reni, depicting the Annunciation with St. Carlo Borromeo, adorned the
Bonfigliuoli collection. See Martyn, The Gentleman’s Guide in his Tour through Italy, p. 105. See also Malvasia,
Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 88; Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni, p. 146. For Reni’s two representations of Carlo
Borromeo in Bologna, see Pepper, Guido Reni, cat. no. 39 and cat. no. 46.
46 It is important to stress that before Borromeo’s arrival in Milan, there was no archbishop in the city, and
Spain’s rule was absolute. On Borromeo’s political struggle and reforms in Milan, see Mols, ‘Saint Charles
Borromée Pionnier de la Pastorale Moderne’, pp. 600–622, and pp. 715–747; Tomaro, ‘San Carlo Borromeo and
the Implementation of the Council of Trent’, pp. 67–84.
47 On the canonization of Carlo Borromeo, see Grattarola, Successi maravigliosi della veneratione di S. Carlo,
pp. 595–605. On the ceremonies which accompanied the canonization, see Grattarola, Successi maravigliosi
della veneratione di S. Carlo, pp. 236–248. Grattarola (p. 447) also described the ceremonial procession bringing
the saint’s relics to the Duomo of Milan in 1612. See also Rasmussen, ‘Liturgy and Iconography’, pp. 264–276.
In such works, indeed, in the same way that the likeness of the Saint whose image
is to be represented should, as much as it is possible, be reproduced, so also care
is to be taken that the effigy of no other man, either living or dead, be purposely
represented.48
By the time the Bolognese painters were commissioned to depict scenes from his
life, St. Carlo’s popularity was at its height.49 Even 30 years after his death, he was
remembered by Catholics as a figure in possession of supernatural powers of succour
and consolation. Books published in the years following his canonization credited
him with a wide range of miracles in places ranging from Milan to Poland. Not sur-
prisingly, reports of these miraculous deeds spread across Europe.
Borromeo was also an important figure from a local point of view, and he was
designated as one of Bologna’s patron saints. He was remembered as a former papal
legate, having been appointed to that position in 1560 by Pope Pius IV.50 According
to Nicholas Terpstra, during that time Borromeo initiated ‘the biggest and most sym-
bolic projects’ in the city’s centre.51 One of his major achievements during his short
appointment in Bologna, which was carried out together with his vice-legate Pier
Donato Cesi, and the encouragement of the Pope, was the establishment of a central
poorhouse under the management of the Opera Pia dei Poveri Mendicanti. A sec-
ond major project was the construction of the Archiginnasio, the university building
designed to bring all university courses in the city under one roof. Both buildings
were inaugurated in 1563.52 When he was canonized, the entire city celebrated the
event. Francesco Luigi Barelli da Nizza noted the ready response of the Bolognese to
48 Borromeo, Instructions on Ecclesiastical Building, p. 60. On the aspiration towards iconographic unity in
ecclesiastical cycles of decoration, see also Knox, ‘The Unified Church Interior in Baroque Italy’, pp. 679–701.
49 For a further discussion of Borromeo’s fame and the many representations of his portrait in art, see Paolo
Aresi’s description from 1644, in which he writes about the many depictions of the saint: ‘Mà che dirò poi della
fama di lui dopò morte? forse si spense con la sua vita? anzimaggiormente si acrebbe, e se forse non poteva
più di atarsi, s’ingrandì, e s’innalzò tanto, che fra poco tempo sù dichiarato Beato, da tutto il Mondo fù stimato
degno d’esser annoverato fra gli altri Santi del Cielo, & al Pontefice Romano, da parte de’maggiori Principi
Christiani, più volte nè fù fatta instanza; Mà che vado io alle orecchie vostre spiegando la fama di lui, ove gli
occhi vostri tanti chiari segni nè voggono, quante sono le cose, che in questo gran Tempio rimirano? forse
che vi mancan voti, che non vi si veggono presenri, che vi è parte alcuna di questa gran Chiesa, che ornata
non si scorga da qualche segno, ò di gratia, ò di miracolo di questo Santo, ò di divotione de’sedeli, e d’ogni
sorte di genti? Anzi, & ove homai non si veggono è memorie, & imagini di lui? risplende il suo ritratto nelle
Chiese, s’adora nelle case, ne’luoghi publici è esposto, nelle tele, e nelle mura si dipinge, nelle carte si stampa,
nelle sete si ricama, ne’legni s’intaglia, nelle cere si colorisce, ne’marmi si scolpisce, ne’ bronzi si fonde, ne gli
argenti s’imprime, nell’oro si forma; e quello, che più importa, ne’cuori di tutti s’innesta.’ Aresi, Panegirici fatti
in diverse occasioni, pp. 41–42.
50 Giussano, Vita di S. Carlo Borromeo, p. 19; Coulson James, Bologna: Its History, Antiquities and Art, p. 162;
Terpstra, Cultures of Charity, p. 197.
51 Terpstra, Cultures of Charity, p. 84; Alexander, From Renaissance to Counter-Reformation, pp. 84–85.
52 The poorhouse was designed in accordance with his plans from the 1540s, when he acted as vice legate
to the city. See Terpstra, Cultures of Charity, p. 84; Alexander, From Renaissance to Counter-Reformation, p. 276;
Terpstra, ‘The Qualità of Mercy’, p. 129.
Practice 131
Carlo Bascapè’s efforts to promote Borromeo’s canonization and to the news about
the approaching ceremony in Rome. The Bolognese celebrated the event three days
after the Roman rites.53
St. Carlo is thus a perfect example in the context of the current discussion, since
his great popularity resulted in visual attention from the major Bolognese painters
and in numerous paintings exhibited in public places throughout Bologna.54 The
representations of St. Carlo in Bolognese churches related to three aspects of his per-
sonality—the leader, the devotee, and the miracle worker. Moreover, his fame meant
that people still remembered what he looked like at the time when Ludovico Carrac-
ci and his cousins began gaining public attention in Bologna. Among the many rep-
resentations, relics, and reproductions of his death mask, one should note Ambrogio
Figino in Milan, who painted a portrait of the saint that was believed to have been
made from life. The portrait was in the Borromeo collection when the saint died in
1584, and is still part of the Ambrosiana collection in Milan. His death mask still cov-
ers his mummified face, which is on view in the Milan Cathedral.55
Reni’s large altarpiece (704 × 341 cm) is divided into three hierarchically arranged
sections. In the celestial section, the Madonna is standing in contemplation before
the dead Christ, who is laid out on a bed. The group is positioned against a hilly land-
scape with the three crosses seen in the distance on the right. The five patron saints
of Bologna—Dominic, Francis, Petronius, Proculus, and, of course, Carlo Borro-
meo—are depicted on the intermediate level with St. Carlo at the centre. The group
is rendered against an entrance to a building flanked by pillars. Below the saints is a
three-dimensional, miniature model of Bologna, which is surrounded by four winged
putti. St. Carlo and his fellow patron saints are portrayed mediating between the city
of Bologna below and the Madonna and Christ above.
53 Barelli da Nizza, Memorie dell’ origine, II, p. 209. See also Chiesa, Vita di Carlo Bascapè, pp. 137–142.
54 The earliest image of St. Carlo in Bologna dates to 1611. It was made by Lorenzo Garbieri for the Barnabite
Church of San Paolo Maggiore. The most prominent painters working in Bologna at that time, including
Garbieri’s master, Ludovico Carracci, followed suite. Ludovico created an altarpiece of St. Carlo Borromeo
Praying in the Sacro Monte in Varallo for Santi Bartolomeo e Gaetano. He also completed St. Carlo Borromeo
adoring Baby Jesus with the Madonna, St. Joseph and Angels for San Fabiano (Pinacoteca Civica, Forlì).
Francesco Brizio created a painting of the saint for San Petronio. Alessandro Tiarini painted an entire cycle
with scenes from Carlo’s life in San Michele in Bosco. His other paintings of the saints are: St. Carlo and Saints
for San Martino Maggiore, Madonna and Child Adorned by Sts. Mathew, Carlo Borromeo and Beato Raniero
Fasani (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna), and St. Carlo Borromeo Baptizing a Boy during the Plague (Musei di
Palazzo Farnese, Piacenza). Giovanni Francesco Gessi depicted the Procession of the Holy Nail in Santa Maria
dei Poveri, and Lucio Massari made a small painting of Carlo Borromeo for the Church of the Madonna del
Baraccano. For Ludovico’s painting in the chapel of Santi Bartolomeo e Gaetano, see Scannelli, Microcosmo
della pittura, p. 342. See also Martyn, The Gentleman’s Guide in his Tour through Italy, pp. 96–97; Pepper, Guido
Reni, cat. no. 39. For Tiarini’s paintings, see Benati and Mazza, Alessandro Tiarini, cat. no. 67 and cat. no. 93.
55 For a discussion of early portraits of St. Carlo Borromeo and of his death mask, see Burzer, San Carlo
Borromeo, pp. 32–36.
A semi-circular surface separates the display of the Pietà in the upper part of the
composition and the representation of the patron saints of Bologna in its central
section. This surface forms the floor for the Madonna and the two angels who flank
her on either side, mourning the dead Christ who lies before them. The Madonna is
folding her fingers in a typical gesture of grief, her head tilted upwards as she g azes
to Heaven to indicate that she is crying (ploro).56 The angel to her right is holding a
handkerchief to his face. The second angel has his arms crossed over his breast in
another typical gesture, demonstrating his faith. Christ is rendered with a fallen
right hand, a gesture associated with death and similarly present in major works: in
Michelangelo’s Pietà (Rome, San Petrus, 1499); in Titian’s three representations of the
Entombment (Paris, Louvre, 1525; Madrid, Prado, 1559; and Madrid, Prado, 1565); and in
Caravaggio’s Entombment for Chiesa Nuova (Rome, Pinacoteca Vaticana, 1603/4). On
the intermediate level, St. Carlo, dressed as a cardinal, kneels at the centre, gazing with
great affection at a crucifix that he holds close to his heart. St. Carlo’s position at the
centre, surrounded by the four other saints, suggests his importance and leadership.
What seems conspicuous in Reni’s altarpiece is the stylistic unity of the celestial and
the terrestrial realms, which emphasizes the differentiation evident only in the rendi-
tion of the saints. This differentiation was identified by Malvasia, who in his description
of the five protector-saints of Bologna observed Reni’s use of a more vigorous (fiero) and
spirited manner where delicacy (delicato) was not required.57 Indeed, one may note two
different styles in the representations of the saints. The two saints whose appearance is
known, St. Carlo Borromeo (Figure 22) and St. Francis, form the first group. The other
saintly figures, who form the second stylistic group, are truthfully characterized, yet are
not depicted in a way that may confuse the viewer with a living person.
Carlo Borromeo has highly distinctive features, evident both in Figino’s portrait
of the saint and in Reni’s painting of him, as well as in the other Bolognese paintings
mentioned earlier. The saint’s facial features became his most recognizable attri-
butes. Under the monk’s tonsure, the elongated face, long aquiline nose, prominent
cheekbones, pale, sunken cheeks, and thin lips leave no room for doubt concerning
the subject’s identity.58
A second distinctive feature, especially in the Papal States, was Borromeo’s
habit. The saint was depicted wearing a long white shirt (rochette) under a short
scarlet cloak (mozzetta).59 Indeed, already in Lorenzo Garbieri’s rendition of The
56 See Bulwer, Chirologia, pp. 28–29, and p. 151.

57 ‘in quelle quattro figure, e S. Carlo, ch’anch’egli, al pari d’ogni altro, sapea alzarsi di maniera, e dar nel
fiero, quando il delicato non fosse stato il suo scopo principale’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 27; ‘on a par
with anyone else, was able to heighten his manner and be vigorous and spirited when delicacy was not the
principal aim’. Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni, p. 66.
58 For St. Carlo’s appearance, see also Giussano, Vita di S. Carlo Borromeo, pp. 520–521.
59 On the rochette, see Braun, Die Liturgische Gewandung im Occident und Orient, p. 126; Norris, Church
Vestments, p. 172. On the mozzetta, see Braun, Die Liturgische Gewandung im Occident und Orient, p. 357; Norris,
Church Vestments, p. 179. See also Jones, ‘The Court of Humility’, p. 169.
Practice 133
Figure 22: Guido Reni, Pietà dei Mendicanti (detail), 1613/16, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna (St. Carlo Borromeo)
(Photo: © Author).
Proclamation of the Barnabites’ Rule (Figure 23), which was completed immediately
after his canonization, the saint is portrayed in these clothes, even though the his-
torical facts confirm that this event took place in Milan, while Borromeo acted as
the city’s archbishop. Accordingly, he should have been depicted in an archbishop’s
attire, including a mitre, a decorated chasuble, and a pallium, instead of the scarlet
mozzetta and biretta.60
60 For a discussion of Garbieri’s painting, see Unger, ‘The Barnabites’ Contribution’, pp. 553–586. For the
pallium as an insignia of the rank of archbishop and higher, see Norris, Church Vestments, p. 33. On the miter
as a sign of a bishop’s and archbishop’s rank, see Braun, Die Liturgische Gewandung im Occident und Orient, p.
425 and p. 622.
Figure 23: Lorenzo Garbieri, The Proclamation of the Barnabites’ Rule, 1611, San Paolo Maggiore, Bologna (Photo:
© Author).
In Reni’s altarpiece, St. Carlo adheres to the above-mentioned iconography. He is

depicted on his knees, adoring a crucifix that he holds in his hands. He has an elon-
gated face, a long, aquiline nose, sunken cheeks, and prominent cheekbones. Since
he is not wearing his biretta, his monk’s tonsure is visible, as is the white rochette
worn under a scarlet mozzetta.
A similar approach can be seen in Reni’s rendition of St. Francis. Here too he
seems to have made an effort to depict the saint as closely as possible to the portrait
of St. Francis as imagined by his contemporaries. St. Francis was a popular saint,
who received much visual attention. His many presentations were based on a single
visual image, believed, as Vasari writes in his book, to have been painted from life by
the thirteenth-century painter Cimabue.61 Reni’s St. Francis is coarsely depicted by
61 ‘Dopo la quale fece, in una tavoletta in campo d’oro, un San Francesco, e lo ritrasse (il che fu cosa nuova in
quei tempi) di naturale, come seppe il meglio; ed intorno ad esso tutte l’istorie della vita sua in venti quadretti,
pieni di figure piccole in campo d’oro.’ Vasari, Le vite de’ più eccellenti pittori scultori ed architettori, I, pp. 249–250.
Practice 135
Figure 24: Guido Reni, Pietà dei Mendicanti (detail), 1613/16, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna (St. Proculus) (Photo:
© Author).
means of bold brushstrokes, which are evident on his high forehead. His elongated
face is covered with a dark beard, and his aquiline nose resembles that of St. Carlo.
St. Francis is wearing his distinct grey-brown burlap robe. On his right hand one may
notice the wound of the stigmata.
A comparison between Reni’s St. Carlo and his St. Proculus (Figure 24), a sixth-cen-
tury Bolognese martyr,62 shows the painter’s different attitude towards representing
the two figures. The most striking difference is that between St. Proculus’ classical
beauty and St. Carlo’s realistic effigy. St. Proculus’ round face, big almond eyes, rosy
cheeks, and straight nose are strikingly different from St. Carlo’s elongated face, sunk-
en, pale cheeks, and long aquiline nose. The two figures seem to belong to two differ-
ent stylistic narratives, which accentuate each other’s particular qualities.
Yet how, one wonders, could a painter prove that his depiction of a saint whose
appearance was not known was not, in fact, a portrait of a real person? And, con-
versely, how could he emphasize the idealistic characteristics of his figure? These
questions are especially relevant in artworks characterized by a sensitivity to natu-
ralistic details, such as the paintings of Caravaggio and Annibale Carracci. Reni, for
instance, slightly modified Proculus’ classical nose to lend the saint a more common
62 Giuseppe Rosaccio, in his 1603 guide to Bologna, described the saint as a ‘valoroso Cavagliro, che sotto
Iustino Imperadore fu martirizato l’anno 519’. Carofano, Negro and Roio, Il Compendio della Nobelissima città
di Bologna di Giuseppe Rosaccio, p. 90.
appearance. Lomazzo referred to this problem in Chapter 28 of his Idea del tem-
pio della pittura, where he advised his readers about the right manner of colouring
bodies:
He must strive with all his force to imitate the natural color in everything, whatever
the attitude or movement he wants to represent, conforming with what he had
conceived in his mind, as clever Titian, Giorgione, and other great painters always
did. For this reason, their works appear really colored by nature, as if each thing
truly represents reality, especially because they were careful never to put two beau-
tiful colors together, placing instead a more or less ugly color next to a beautiful
one, so that these would mutually derive supplementary grace from each other.63
According to Lomazzo, the coupling of contrasts serves to highlight both attitudes.

In the Carracci paintings, for example, Lomazzo’s dichotomy of colours is extended
to additional elements, such as the accentuation of a saint’s ideal portrait in con-
trast to a figure whose facial features are naturalistically portrayed. One example is
Agostino Carracci’s altarpiece, Last Communion of St. Jerome, for San Girolamo del-
la Certosa, which today resides at the Pinacoteca Nazionale in Bologna (Figure 25).
Malvasia described it as ‘a harmonious mix of all the styles.’64 St. Jerome is depicted
traditionally, as an old man with white hair and a white beard. He is kneeling before
a bishop who is about to give him the sacramental bread (hostia). The two are sur-
rounded by Carthusian monks. Three figures stand out in this painting. The first is
the bishop who is giving the saint his last Communion, who has a highly distinctive
face with coarsely painted, unshaven, greenish cheeks. The second is a monk on the
far left (Figure 26), looking down in contemplation and holding his chin in his right
hand while a single lock of hair accentuates his baldness. The third figure on the far
right is located in close proximity to St. Jerome (Figure 27). Holding a handkerchief
in his right hand, he supports the old saint below the elbow with his left hand. This
second monk, who is attentive to the old, dying saint, has a very distinctive aquiline
nose, prominent cheekbones, dark eyebrows, and conspicuous ears. His plebeian,
naturalistic features stand out in contrast to the other figures in the painting, whose
refined traits follow the classical rules of representation. A similar hierarchy, albeit
one that lacks distinct stylistic differentiation, characterizes Raphael’s decoration of
the Stanza della Segnatura, where there is a clear distinction between identifiable
and ideal figures.65 The portrayal of these three figures is strikingly different from the
recognizable image of St. Jerome and the classical representation of the other figures.
63 Lomazzo, Idea of the Temple of Painting, p. 124.

64 ‘che di tutte le maniere è un concertato misto’. Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 391. Summerscale, Malvasia’s
Life of the Carracci, p. 145.
65 Unger, ‘The Pope, the Painter, and the Dynamics of Social Standing’, pp. 273–274.
Practice 137
Figure 25: Agostino Carracci, Last Communion of St. Jerome, 1591/2, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna (Photo:
© Author).
Although one may wonder about the identity of the three figures in Agostino’s
painting, the current discussion calls for an examination of their stylistically distinct
depictions. One may argue that mixing classically depicted figures with realistical-
ly represented individuals serves to emphasize the unique characterization of each
Figure 26: Agostino Carracci, Last Communion of St. Jerome (detail), 1591/2, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna
(Photo: © Author).
group. This idea received attention by Paleotti, who emphasized the differentiation
between the likeness of a virtuous saint and that of an enemy of the faith, such as
Nebuchadnezzar, Herod, or Nero. Yet Agostino’s three figures, it seems, were realisti-
cally depicted solely in order to highlight the figure of the dying St. Jerome.66
Practice 139
Figure 27: Agostino Carracci, Last Communion of St. Jerome (detail), 1591/2, Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bologna
(Photo: © Author).
In another altarpiece completed by Annibale Carracci, this stylistic distinction

between different figures is even more conspicuous. In his Crucifixion with Saints
Bernard di Siena, Francis, Petronius, John, and Mourners from 1583 (Figure 28), com-
pleted according to Malvasia for San Nicolò di San Felici and today in Santa Maria
della Carità, Annibale depicted St. John on the right, gazing at the viewer while
pointing with both his hands toward the Crucifixion.67 In the distance, behind the
crucified Christ, is a view of Jerusalem; beneath it, a small model of Bologna with its
67 The painting has been in its current location since 1956. In the seventeenth century, it was in the
Macchiavelli Chapel in San Nicolò di San Felice in Bologna. See Posner, Annibale Carracci, II, cat. no. 6. For
this painting, see also Posner, Annibale Carracci, I, pp. 3–4.
Figure 28: Annibale Carracci, Crucifixion with Saints Bernard di Siena, Francis, Petronius, John and Mourners, 1583,
Santa Maria della Carità, Bologna (Photo: © Author).
Practice 141
two adjacent towers appears beside a skull and a prayer book. The Bolognese towers
replicate a tower discernible in the image of Jerusalem. In this early altarpiece, con-
sidered to be Annibale’s first major commission, one can observe the incorporation
of ‘low’ plebeian figures into a work of ‘high’ art.68 In discussing this aspect of the
painting and of an additional composition, Annibale’s Baptism of Christ (Figure 29),
Malvasia stated that the painter was criticized for having taken as models simple
people without employing the faculties of judgment or the imagination, thus show-
ing little or no understanding of art. Annibale was also blamed for having depicted
different types of figures without creating a unified composition befitting an altar-
piece.69 Although Malvasia did not elaborate on the nature of the different figures,
what seems evident is that Annibale depicted an idealized Christ on the cross sur-
rounded by the Madonna and familiar saints, such as St. Francis, St. Bernardino, and
St. Petronius, alongside a young, unkempt St. John the Evangelist, who was depicted
with a serious and angry look on his face. This work was recognized by Prodi as a
representative of the modern altarpiece, which is characterized by a notable equilib-
rium between its devotional and narrative functions—that is, between the transcen-
dent realm and historical reality.70 The stylistic distinction between these two modes
of representation underscores the difference between these two realms.
In creating a contrast between the portrayal of St. Carlo and that of St. Proculus,
Reni thus followed both of the Carracci brothers, who highlighted their main protag-
onists by adding realistically depicted figures to their paintings. In Reni’s case, how-
ever, this strategy was employed in a reverse manner, so that the classically depicted
St. Proculus serves to accentuate St. Carlo’s realistic effigy.
Other Eclectic Paintings
Annibale’s assemblage of styles as well as his adherence to former Mannerist prac-

tice, was acknowledged in modern scholarship. In her 1997 article on Annibale’s early
drawings, Clare Robertson addressed Annibale’s Baptism of Christ (Figure 29) as a
complex painting, ‘which is more than mere eclecticism […] where there are allu-
sions to Correggio, Veronese, and Barocci. The preparatory studies for this work show
a comparable mixture of stylistic influences.’71 Indeed, in this altarpiece, completed a
decade before Ludovico created his St. George altarpiece in the same church of Santi
Gregorio e Siro, one can find a marked stylistic difference between the main protag-
onists, St. John the Baptist and Christ, and the secondary figures on the left, the two
68 For the use of these terms in relation to Annibale’s altarpiece, see Robertson, ‘Annibale Carracci and
Invenzione’, p. 3.
69 Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 363; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, pp. 92–93.
70 Prodi, ‘Introduction’, p. 11.
71 Robertson, ‘Annibale Carracci and Invenzione’, p. 4.
Figure 29: Annibale Carracci, Baptism of Christ, 1585, Santi Gregorio e Siro, Bologna (Photo: © Archivio Fotografico
del Polo Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Baldassarri).
Practice 143
young boys who are pointing toward the baptism of Christ. These boys, especially
the one who is taking off his shirt, are a variation on a drawing that Annibale had
made after a live model. Annibale, Robertson argued, made different drawings that
he later used after building up the poses in order to suit the purpose of the second-
ary figure—a common Mannerist practice.72 Significantly, the two boys are depicted
in a very different style than the main protagonists, in terms of both their brighter
palette and their resemblance to well-known Mannerist figures, especially those by
Pontormo. See, for example, the figure at the bottom left in Annibale’s painting, who
resembles the Hallberdier or the young man carrying Christ’s legs in the Capponi
chapel Deposition (Figure 30). This resemblance shows Annibale’s association with
his Mannerist predecessors. These stylized young figures also relate to the group of
musicians at the upper part of the altarpiece.
Dempsey expressed a similar perception of Annibale’s development at the outset
of his career. Writing about the Baptism of Christ (Figure 29) and the Pietà (Galleria
Nazionale, Parma), which were both completed in 1585, he emphasized their differ-
ent attitudes and styles. The Baptism of Christ is in the style of Federico Barocci. The
composition’s upper, celestial part is characterized by delicate, boneless, and soft fig-
ures, with hazy colouring and a light palette typical of Barocci. The Pietà, meanwhile,
owes much to Correggio, and is characterized by a different play and diffusion of light
that results in a darker palette and firmer figures.73
Dempsey’s analysis brings to mind Malvasia’s acknowledgment of Ludovico’s abil-
ity to ‘deploy all the styles of the greatest masters, especially since for each scene he
could adopt the particular style that was most in keeping with and most suited to
the subject at hand.’ Annibale, as one may understand from Dempsey’s discussion,
seemed to have had the same ability, even though Dempsey does not attend to it
directly, focusing instead on Annibale’s process of learning about the use of colours
from the stylistic strengths of Barocci, Correggio, and Veronese, in that order.74
In his book on Annibale Carracci’s Butcher’s Shop, Claude Douglas Dickerson
remarked on Annibale’s continuous use of the naturalist elements he had studied
during his youth in Bologna, which are evident even in the paintings that he later
produced in Rome. According to Dickerson:
even as he [Annibale] advanced toward his great masterpiece, the classically

themed frescoes in the Palazzo Farnese, Rome, he never completely turned his
back on nature’s lessons. His later figures, despite their considerable idealization,
move and gesture with all the conviction of actual human beings.75
72 Robertson, ‘Annibale Carracci and Invenzione’, p. 21.

73 Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 9–10.
75 Dickerson, Raw Painting, p. 3.
Figure 30: Pontormo, Deposition, 1525/8, Cappella Capponi, Santa Felicita, Florence (Photo: Alinari, Fratelli).
Annibale is recognized as maintaining the characteristics that dominated his earli-

er, Bolognese style, while developing another, more classically oriented style that is
evident in his Roman works. This view follows upon Walter Friedlaender’s observa-
tion that Annibale’s style is distinctive in how he ‘represented the visionary in firm,
almost classical, constructions, but without relinquishing the coloristic impressions
of his youth in northern Italy’.76
76 Friedlaender, Mannerism, p. 79.

Practice 145
Figure 31: Annibale Carracci, Butcher’s Shop, 1582/3, Christ Church, Oxford (Photo: By permission of the Governing
Body of Christ Church, Oxford).
This kind of duality in style is evident in Annibale’s work throughout his career.
In his Butcher’s Shop (Figure 31) of 1582/3, one may easily note that the four butchers,
who appear focused on their work, represent four different aspects of a butcher’s
daily labour. Basing his observations on earlier eighteenth-century accounts, Gustav
Friedrich Waagen identified them as a self-portrait and three portraits of the other
Carracci painters as butchers.77 Regardless of the truth or falsity of this identification,
it bespeaks Waagen’s acknowledgment that the butchers were drawn from life. Of
the two customers present in the painting, one of them, as noted by John Rupert
Martin, is a comic halberdier, who is depicted in a different, satirical manner. His
theatrical posture is accentuated by his attempt to reach his handbag while he ‘bal-
ances his weapon in ungainly fashion’, as described by Martin. His position comple-
ments his distinctive, almost caricature-like face and foolish expression.78 As Sheila
McTighe has suggested, this differentiation between the butchers and the halberdier
give rise to a reading centred on the social position of the artist, his integration of
77 Waagen, Treasures of Art in Great Britain. III, p. 47.

78 Martin, ‘The Butcher’s Shop of the Carracci’, p. 263. For its comic overtone, see also Mahon, ‘Afterthoughts
on the Carracci Exhibition’, p. 268; Wind, ‘Annibale Carracci’s “Scherzo”’, pp. 93–96; McTighe, ‘Foods and the
Body’, p. 315.
intellectual and manual labour, and social hierarchy.79 This last theme corresponds
to the painter’s choice to depict the shop from within rather than from the outside.
The point of view he chose was that of the butcher, rather than of the customers
or patron, who would be looking in from the outside or from the other side of the
counter. The naturalistic depiction of the four butchers, in contrast to the unnatural,
comic rendition of the halberdier, seems to suggest that the painting was an attempt
to ridicule the customers.
This diversity of styles was an obvious outcome of an age that encouraged artists to
develop their own individual styles, and should be considered as part of any attempt
to explain the development of seventeenth-century painting.80 Denis Mahon defined
the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries as a period of experimentation:
one of the most refreshing discoveries one can make when investigating this
youthful and energetic phase is to find that they were on the whole a not unen-
lightened lot, were ready to cast their net pretty widely, and had surprisingly few
prejudices—among which exclusive devotion to classic-idealist theory can hardly
be numbered.81
In this respect, Annibale was a man of his time. He was able to produce a landscape
painting in one style, the Butcher’s Shop in two different styles, and a whole range of
fantastic interactions between the Olympian gods in the Galleria Farnese in a third
style. Why would an artist of his calibre limit himself to a single stylistic direction
rather than remaining open to explore different possibilities?
In reviewing Carl Goldstein’s book, John Gash admitted that the term ‘eclecticism’
was probably best suited to defining what he called the Carracci model of ‘gathering’,
despite the pejorative overtone and negative association of the term. Yet Gash thus
reduces Annibale’s endeavour to a mere act of gathering from different sources, address-
ing it as an eclectic practice rather than acknowledging it as a theory. In his review, Anni-
bale was no different in this practice from any other painter who studied, emulated, and
was influenced by the masters of the past.82 Taking Gash’s review as a frame of reference,
one may even discern the use of different styles in a single work of art.
In early modern artistic discourse, Annibale Carracci was regarded as a painter
who was open to different and varied styles. Towards the end of his poem De Arte
Graphica (1668), for instance, the French artist Charles-Alphonse Dufresnoy wrote
that Annibale’s unique trait was his ability to combine Raphael, Michelangelo, Giulio
Romano, Correggio, and Titian in his art—a feat that only a great painter could
achieve after many years of study:
79 McTighe, ‘Foods and the Body’, p. 316.

80 See Kemp, ‘“Equal Excellences”’, pp. 1–26.
81 Mahon, ‘On Some Aspects of Caravaggio and His Times’, p. 36.
82 Gash, ‘Hannibal Carrats’, p. 245.
Practice 147
Soon, when judgment has grown with the passage of years, you should consider
carefully and in the right order, and in all their particularities […] those individual
works celebrated by the Romans, Venetians, Parmese or Bolognese as examples of
the first class.
Among these Raphael achieved miracles of invention in the finest style, and beau-
ties that no-one since has matched. Michelangelo had a more powerful under-
standing of everything that concerns form.
Giulio Romano, raised from a child in the cave of the Muses, unlocked the treasures
of Parnassus, and in a painted poetry never before seen, but only heard from poets,
opened the sanctuary of Phoebus for us to behold; and in those wars the mighty
fortune of heroes crowned with laurelled triumphs, and other glorious events, he
seemed to paint the ancient scene more nobly than itself.
Correggio stands out more brilliantly before the other, suffused with generous light,
with shadows gathered all around, for his grand style of painting and his rendering of
bodies in colour. The harmony, and tone, and deceptive tricks of colour, and the ensem-
ble of the composition, were so laid out by Titian that he was called divine, and elevated
to great honours and well-deserved wealth. And all of the achievements of these mas-
ters diligent Annibale drew together in his own spirit and style with marvelous art.83
The author then goes on to make the connection between eclecticism and the Car-
racci, explicitly noting that Annibale picked, chose, and combined the achievements
of five masters.
In a similar spirit, Bellori mentioned a letter that he had received from Annibale’s
pupil, Francesco Albani, who wrote:
Nor can it be said that they learned their style solely from the works of Correggio,
because they went to Venice and finally to Rome; and instead one can say that from
Titian as well, and lastly from Raphael and Michelangelo together, they achieved a
style that partakes of all the rarest masters, a mixture that appears to conform to all
the most excellent ones, as can be seen in the Farnese Gallery, in which their style
surpassed others in invention and disegno.84
83 See Dufresnoy, De Arte Graphica, p. 209. See also Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 41–42, n.
50 and pp. 56–57.
84 ‘Nè si può dire che dall’opere solamente del Correggio apprendessero lo stile, perche andarono à Venetia,
& ultimamente à Roma; e più tosto si può dire che anche da Titiano, & ultimamente da Rafaelle, e da Michel
Angelo insieme conseguissero una maniera, che participava di tutti li più rari maestri, un misto che pare
conformarsi con tutti li più eccellenti, come si vede nella Galeria Farnese, nella quale prevalse all’altre
nell’inventione, e disegno.’ Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni, p. 80; Bellori, The Lives of the
Modern Painters, p. 99. This testimony by Albani should be examined in relation to Lomazzo’s Adam and Eve,
as well as Agostino’s sonnet, which must have been known to Albani, mainly because both Rome and Venice
are mentioned together with four painters: Correggio, Titian, Raphael, and Michelangelo.
Published in 1672, this statement clearly attends to eclecticism by including as sourc-

es of influence not only Correggio, but also Titian, Raphael, and Michelangelo. Alba-
ni notes that the Carracci brothers saw the works of Correggio—suggesting that they
had visited Parma, as well as Venice and Rome—and that their style was a mixture of
the styles of those painters and others as well. This testimony should be compared to
Agostino’s sonnet, since both accounts mention Rome and Venice together with four
painters: Correggio, Titian, Raphael, and Michelangelo.
The writers mentioned above all address the importance of picking, choosing,
and assimilating different styles into a single painting. This may relate to the term
‘mixture’ (misto), which is acknowledged by Loh as the most suitable term for this
kind of combination and assimilation of styles.85 These writers do not, however, show
any appreciation of non-assimilated eclecticism, nor do they mention a connection
between eclecticism and the content of a painting.
Probably the best example of non-assimilated eclecticism among Annibale’s reli-
gious paintings is his Madonna and Child Enthroned with St. John the Baptist, St. John
the Evangelist and St. Catherine of Alexandria (Plate 8). Annibale completed this work
in 1593 for the Bolognese Church of San Giorgio, and it remained in situ until 1823.
Today it is part of the collection of the Pinacoteca Nazionale in Bologna. The paint-
ing is signed and dated at the bottom of the left column.86
Madonna Enthroned with St. John the Evangelist and St. Catherine of Alexandria
was constructed as a pyramidal composition, with three main antagonists situated
against a typical architectural setting of a vaulted niche set between two classical col-
umns. The Madonna at the centre is seated on a pedestal with two babies, Jesus and
St. John the Baptist, who are amusing themselves around her right knee. Flanking the
Madonna are the two saints: St. John the Evangelist with a chalice containing a snake,
and St. Catherine of Alexandria, who stands on her wheel. A niche in the pedestal
directly below the Madonna contains a relief of King David playing the harp.
Ludovico, according to Malvasia, immediately recognized the painting’s eclectic
character. He admired it and praised his younger cousin for his ability to combine dif-
ferent styles taken from four earlier painters in a single painting, and still to produce
a great painting. As already noted in the introduction, Ludovico supposedly stated:
‘to imitate a single master is to make oneself his follower and his inferior, while to
draw from all four of them and also select things from other painters is to make one-
self their judge and leader.’87 Malvasia similarly commended Annibale for his ability
to select and use different styles in a single work of art:
85 Loh, ‘New and Improved’, pp. 484–489.

86 Posner attributed the painting to Annibale Carracci but added that it was possible that Lucio Massari had
also contributed to it. See Posner, Annibale Carracci, II, p. 31; Benati and Riccòmini, Annibale Carracci, p. 260.
87 See p. 38.
Practice 149
Here, he [Annibale] too sought a mix of styles that united the manner of Titian, of
Correggio, Veronese, and Parmigianino, taking all of Parmigianino’s grace for his St.
Catherine, who is presented in the most regal garments and the loveliest of serpentine
poses, turning and unwinding in an attitude as lovely as Nicolò dell’Abate’s famous fig-
ure of the woman with the key; and in the young Saint John there is a childlike simplic-
ity about the way he plays with and delights in the Christ Child that reminds us of the
angels in the great cupola of Parma, just as in the majesty of the Virgin we see Veronese
and in the saint John the Evangelist we see Titian’s figure, but as is sculptured.88
It is interesting to note how close this description is to Agostino’s sonnet. Malvasia

mentioned, among others, the names of Titian, Correggio, Parmigianino, and Nicolò
dell’Abate, which were all cited in the sonnet. What is striking in this description is
the distinction between the sources of influence that shaped the depiction of each
of the figures—the Madonna in the manner of Veronese, the figure of St. John in the
manner of Titian, and the figure of St. Catherine in the manner of Parmigianino and
Nicolò dell’Abate. This stylistic difference between the figures represents a non-as-
similated eclectic approach.
To Malvasia’s initial observation, one should add Annibale’s choice to illuminate
each of the three main protagonists differently: St. John’s dark and shaded figure
stands out in contrast to St. Catherine, who is bright and white. The Madonna’s group
is the most colourful, with a very delicate and graduated chiaroscuro. The sharp con-
trast of light and shade in the figure of St. Catherine accentuates its linear style, which
is absent from the rendering of the other figures. The diffusion of light, so different in
each of the groups, defines the range of the colours. This contrast can be exemplified
in the garments of the Madonna and St. John. Although their clothes are painted in
the same colours, St. John’s garments are painted with deeper shades of red and blue,
since the painter used a different scale of colours for each of the figures. Additionally,
St. Catherine’s face is more elongated than that of the other figures.
There is an obvious connection between Annibale’s painting and some of his
admired predecessors, which were identified not only by Malvasia, but also by mod-
ern scholars such as Wittkower and Posner. Wittkower’s well-known Art and Archi-
tecture in Italy (1958) and Posner’s ground-breaking study of Annibale both stressed
his use of select stylistic elements taken from different artistic sources and combined
in a single painting. They observed central Italian High Renaissance compositional
88 ‘Quì tentò anch’egli un misto di maniere, e d’unir’insieme il fare di Tiziano, del Coreggio, di Paolo, e
del Parmigiano, pescando tutta la sua grazia nella S. Caterina, che sì regiamente vestita, sì leggiadramente
volgendosi, e svincolandosi, non meno della femminina famosa dalla Chiava di Nicolò dell’Abbate, serpeggia:
il S. Giovannino che con tanta puerile semplicità anch’egli col Signorino scherza e festeggia, della gran Cupola
di Parma gli Angeli ci raccordano: nella maestà della B. V. Il gran Veronese, e nell’ Evangelista Giovanni, quel
da Cadore tu vedi scolpito.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, I, p. 388; Summerscale, Malvasia’s Life of the Carracci, pp.
138–139.
settings, a contrapposto connection between the two saints that can be traced to
Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, and Fra Bartolommeo, the colouring of Correggio and
Titian, and modelling typical of Veronese.89
Wittkower suggested that Annibale selected stylistic motifs from earlier painters
and combined them in his paintings undisguised, so that viewers could detect his
sources of influence. In doing so, Wittkower argued, Annibale was responding to a
traditional method used by Renaissance artists and propagated by such great men
as Leonardo da Vinci, which continued to be used until the late eighteenth century.
Wittkower maintained that combining different artistic sources into a single, unified
work of art seemed natural for an early sixteenth-century audience. He distinguished
between two types of imitation: a successful one, in which it was almost impossible
to discern the sources of influence; and an unsuccessful attempt, in which the imita-
tion of earlier artists was too obvious. He referred to this second, unsuccessful type
of assimilation as ‘eclecticism’, explaining it as the ‘lack of co-ordination and trans-
formation of models’.90 Annibale thus fell into this second category, even if his undis-
guised stylistic choices were intentional, and his experimentalism was reduced to fit
a single stylistic approach characteristic of the Renaissance. Wittkower, who judged
the painting from a Vasarian perspective, seemed to ignore the historical process that
had begun in the fifteenth century, was further developed in the sixteenth century by
the Mannerists, and had reached a climax in the works of the Bolognese masters of
the late sixteenth century and seventeenth century. What began in the fifteenth cen-
tury as an attempt to produce the most perfect unified painting, based on the study
of the human figure, classical art, and the imitation of nature, developed in the next
century into an individualistic attempt by the great masters to formulate a different
and distinctive manner. The distinctiveness of the Bolognese painters rests on their
organized and clear-cut attempt to use different and varied styles in a single work of
art for the purpose of accentuating the idea of the painting or its message.
One famous example of eclecticism in Reni’s work is St. Michael the Archangel
(Figure 5), which was commissioned by Cardinal Antonio Barberini, Pope Urban
VIII’s nephew. Reni completed the work in 1635 for Santa Maria della Concezione.
The archangel and the devil beneath his left foot are depicted differently in terms of
both their colours and the brushwork. The Archangel is colourful and painted with
delicate brushwork, while the devil is depicted in monochrome with bold brush-
strokes. The use of white paint, which accentuates the devil’s boldness, is absent
from the handling of the archangel’s colour. Reni’s depiction of both figures is remi-
niscent of Comanini’s description of Figino’s painting of the Archangel Michael and
Lucifer, mentioned in Chapter One; this description was also mentioned in Reni’s
letter to Massani, which was published by Bellori.91
89 Wittkower, Art and Architecture in Italy 1600–1750, p. 32; Posner, Annibale Carracci, I, p. 50.
90 Wittkower, Art and Architecture in Italy 1600–1750, p. 32.
91 See pp. 74–75.
Practice 151
Figure 32: Guido Reni, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, c. 1630, J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles (Photo: © Author).
Reni’s painting follows Paleotti’s instructions in depicting the devil as an accesso-

ry of the saint. The archbishop had written that one should not depict heretics, with
the exception of scenes portraying their downfall, such as expulsion from Heaven,
punishment, or other narratives underscoring their destructive character:
There is an exception, though, when images of heretics do appear alongside those

of saints but as accessories to them, such that it would be clear that they were
painted [espresse] because the main action required it, as when Simon is convicted
by Saint Peter, or Eutychius by Saint Gregory, or the Arians in various councils, and
so on.92
Accordingly, Reni’s devil appears as an attribute of St. Michael, in a narrative that

emphasizes subjugation to the saint.
92 ‘intendendosi però quando tali imagini non fossero meschiate con quelle de’santi, mà come accessorie a
quelle, talche si vedesse che per necessità dell’historia principale fossero state espresse, come quando Simone
è convinto da s. Pietro, ò Eutichio da s. Gregorio, ò gli Arriani in varij concilij, ò simili altri essempi.’ Paleotti,
Discorso, p. 165; Paleotti, Discourse on Sacred and Profane Images, p. 211.
Figure 33: Guercino, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, 1649, National Gallery of Art, Washington. (Photo: Patrons’
Permanent Fund Accession No.1986.17.2).
One last painting by Reni, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife (Figure 32), exemplifies the
same type of eclecticism evident in Alliance between Disegno and Colore (Figure 4).
Peter Björn Kerber acknowledged a similarity between the two paintings in terms
of their composition and design, and dated both as having been made at almost the
same time. He further noticed that the two female figures are identical—Potiphar
is a copy of Colore. To Kerber’s observations, one should add Reni’s use of different
styles in his depictions of the two main protagonists, namely Joseph and Potiphar.
Joseph resembles the personification of Colour, with his patchy figure standing out
in contrast to the carefully delineated figure of Potiphar’s wife. The shadow cast on
Joseph’s eyes replicates the one covering Disegno’s eyes. The stylistic differences
between the protagonists were meant to accentuate their opposing positions in the
narrative. The classicized wife of Potiphar, who has a destructive role in the story,
stands out in contrast to the virtuous Joseph, who is depicted in a painterly style.
The biblical story (Genesis 39:1–20) focuses on the seductive attempts made by
Potiphar’s wife to draw Joseph into her bed, and his continuous rejection. The cli-
mactic moment in the story arrives when she manages to grab his garment. After he
escapes, she accuses him of trying to seduce her, and Joseph is thrown into jail. Since
Practice 153
Figure 34: Carlo Cignani, Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, c. 1670/80, Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden (Photo
© bpk-Bildagentur).
Potiphar’s wife, in Reni’s rendition, is half-naked and pulling the garment, it is per-
fectly clear who is the aggressor in the painting. Joseph leans backwards, holding the
garment in one hand, while showing his surprise with the other. Both protagonists
are looking at one another.
What seems important in Reni’s rendition of more than one style in a single paint-
ing is the extent of his influence on depictions of this scene by other masters, such
as Guercino (1649/50) and Carlo Cignani, Albani’s student (1680). After examining
Reni’s painting, one notices the same stylistic separation between the two main
protagonists in both Guercino and Cignani’s paintings. In Guercino’s Joseph and
Potiphar’s Wife (Figure 33),93 Joseph’s arm and hand are painted with bold strokes of
paint, while Potiphar’s wife is classically portrayed, with a refined white arm. Guer-
cino uses hand gestures to tell the story, a method typical of his work. Joseph, with

his painterly right arm, is trying to prevent Potiphar’s wife from grabbing his chin.
With his left hand, he is expressing his wish to end this aggressive use of force, while
she is pulling his blue garment, an important element in the iconography of the
scene. Cignani (Figure 34) depicted the scene differently, though he, too, differenti-
ated between the two main protagonists by depicting Potiphar’s wife in a painterly
manner, while Joseph’s figure has a streaked, classical appearance. Potiphar’s wife is
clothed in a beautiful and distinctive fabric, while Joseph’s red garment is painterly
and boldly depicted with rough white brushstrokes. It is difficult to discern a pattern
in the stylistic choices made by Reni, Guercino, and Cignani.
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Practice 155
Christiansen, Keith, ‘A Late Masterpiece by Ludovico Carracci: The Tanari Denial of St. Peter’, Burlington
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Haskell, and Frances Muecke (Genève: Librairie Droz S. A., 2005).
Freedberg, Sydney Joseph, Circa 1600: A Revolution of Style in Italian Painting (Cambridge, MA: Harvard
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Friedlaender, Walter, Mannerism and Anti-Mannerism in Italian Painting (New York: Schocken, 1957; repr.
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4. Criticism
Abstract
Chapter Four centres on a cultural art history of eclecticism’s reception and rejec-
tion. It focuses on the historical perception and evolution of the term ‘eclecticism’
in artistic discourse, from its introduction into the art-historical vocabulary by the
German antiquarian and archaeologist Johann Joachim Winckelmann in the second
half of the eighteenth century. It discusses its waning acceptance in the nineteenth
century. It elaborates on Denis Mahon’s call in the twentieth century to dismiss the
term ‘eclecticism’ from art-historical discourse in order to do away with its negative
and pejorative associations.
Keywords: Winckelmann, juste milieu, Denis Mahon, Donald Posner, Baudelaire,

Cousin
When Winckelmann coined the term ‘eclecticism’, the cultural and artistic hegemo-
ny of the time promoted the artistic ideal of the belle nature, which largely built on
Bellori’s idea del bello. As Bellori stated, ‘painters and sculptors, selecting the most
elegant beauties of nature, perfect the Idea, and their works come to surpass and
remain superior to nature, which is the ultimate merit of these arts’.1 Painters and
theorists alike were thus open to the term in its most general meaning.
It may be assumed that in applying this term to the work of the Carracci, Winckel-
mann, who borrowed it from philosophy and applied it to artistic creation, sought to
refer to what was commonly known about the Carracci’s connection to their classical
heritage, as well as to the great masters of the sixteenth century. Yet by the nine-
teenth century, the original, comprehensive definition of this term had become dis-
torted and limited. Eclecticism ceased to be viewed as a container encompassing all
the stylistic possibilities among which one could pick and choose. Instead, it came to
be viewed through the prism of Baudelaire’s derisive metaphor of a ship advancing
towards its destination with sails set to four opposing winds, and came to be derided
as a mechanical attempt to incorporate different and even opposing styles into a sin-
gle work of art. This distorted definition of eclecticism and its negative implications
1 ‘li Pittori, e gli Scultori scegliendo le più eleganti bellezze naturali, perfettionano l’Idea, & l’opere loro
vengono ad avanzarsi, e restar superiori alla natura, che è l’ultimo pregio di queste arti’. Bellori, Le vite de’
pittori, scultori et architetti moderni, p. 12; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 62.
doi: 10.5117/9789462986015/ch04
had a devastating impact on the popularity of the Carracci and of their immediate
Bolognese followers.
The rise of Romantic sentiments among members of the following artistic gen-
eration made it impossible for them to accept what they viewed as a rational meth-
od that promoted a combination of styles, just as they refuted the ideology of the
juste milieu, with its suggestion of stylistic compromise. By the end of the century,
the Romantic conception of the untameable Genius motivated by creative instinct
was replaced by a contrast between the rebellious bohemian and the academician.
This was the view that in the first half of the twentieth century fostered a new appre-
ciation of Caravaggio. Yet it also had a negative impact on eclecticism, which by that
time had been deeply instilled within the academy. Mahon’s call for a dismissal of
eclecticism built on this modern notion of artistic creation.
Winckelmann’s Introduction of Eclecticism into Artistic Discourse
When Winckelmann first applied the term ‘eclecticism’ and related it to the Carrac-
ci, the members of this family of painters, as well as Reni and Guercino, were all
still renowned as great and important painters.2 In his account of the Salon of 1767,
the French philosopher Denis Diderot mentioned the Carracci in the same breath as
Raphael and Titian, arguing that he would have recognized and denounced as pla-
giarism any composition, scene, figure, head, character, or expression borrowed from
Raphael, the Carracci, Titian, or any other painter.3 Diderot’s statement reveals that
the Carracci were copied just as extensively as Raphael and Titian and thus caution
was required in matters of attribution. This statement also shows that Diderot found
it important to state his familiarity with the Carracci’s work. In his History of Paint-
ing in Italy, first published in the late eighteenth century, Luigi Lanzi expressed the
extent of the Bolognese school of painting’s influence by stating: ‘To write the history
of the Caracci and their followers would in fact be almost the same as to write the
pictoric history of all Italy during the last two centuries.’4 Mariette responded to Wil-
liam Kent’s attempts to have the engraver Zocchi produce engravings after paintings
by Guercino by stating that the English were passionate about Guercino’s drawings.5
2 For the reception of the Bolognese school of painting in the eighteenth century, see Senkevitch, ‘The
Critical Reception of the Bolognese School’, pp. 94–99.
3 ‘S’il y avait une ordonnance, des incidents, une figure, une tête, un caractère, une expression empruntés
de Raphaël, des Carraches, du Titien, ou d’un autre, je reconnaìtrais le plagiat, et je vous le dénoncerais.’
Diderot, Oeuvres, II, p. 4.
4 Lanzi, The History of Painting in Italy, III, p. 64. ‘Scriver la storia de’ Caracci e de’ lor seguaci è quasi
scriver la storia pittorica di tutta Italia da due secoli in qua.’ Lanzi, Storia pittorica della Italia, II, p. 70. See also
Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, p. 6.
Criticism 161
Figure 35: Johann Zoffany, The Tribuna of the Uffizi, 1772/8, Royal Collection, Windsor Castle (Photo: Royal Collec-
tion Trust / © Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II 2018).
One way of evaluating the Bolognese painters’ degree of fame is by examining

eighteenth-century depictions of collections and galleries, since the painter’s deci-
sion concerning which paintings should be included in his portrayal of a gallery
reveals the taste of his audience. Johann Zoffany’s The Tribuna of the Uffizi (Figure 35)
of 1772/8 is a good example of this genre.
Among the most celebrated masterpieces depicted in this painting, which includes
works by Raphael, Titian, and Rubens, one may also find the works of the Bolognese
painters. Reni’s Cleopatra of 1635/40 and Vergine Addolorata of 1640 are located in the
upper corner formed by the central and right-hand gallery walls, between Raphael’s
St. John the Baptist in the Desert (c. 1518/20) on the left and Rubens’ Self-Portrait with
His Brother Philip Rubens, Justus Lipsius and Johannes Woverius (1611/12) on the right.
Several other paintings by Raphael and Titian are also included in the painting. The
most conspicuous one is Titian’s Venus of Urbino, which is being examined by the
5 ‘Les Anglois sont passionnés pour les desseins de Guerchin. Un des leurs, je crois M. Kent, fit graver,
étant à Florence, quelques dessein de ce maître, et y employa le Zocchi.’ de Chennevières and de Montaiglon,
Abecedario de P. J. Mariette, I, p. 64. See also Mahon and Turner, The Drawings of Guercino in the Collection of
Her Majesty the Queen at Windsor Castle, p. xxviii.
distinguished members of the tribunal. Lying on the floor to the left of Titian’s paint-
ing is Guercino’s Sibilla Samia (1651). Reni and Guercino, as Zoffany’s painting seems
to indicate, were much appreciated in the late eighteenth century and received their
place among the most celebrated Old Masters.
Winckelmann was rather enthusiastic about the Carracci when he described them
as eclectics. As Mahon notes, he was the first writer to use this term in order to define,
in a single word, the Carracci’s methodology. In doing so, he was also the first writer
to use eclecticism in an art-historical context. In his Abhandlung von der Fähigkeit der
Empfindung des Schönen in der Kunst (1763), Winckelmann described the success of
the Carracci academy in reviving painting, as well as their eclectic approach:
Almost fifty years after Raphael the school of the Carraccis began to flourish, the
founder of which, Ludovico, the older of them, saw Rome for only fourteen days,
and as a result could not do as well as his cousins, especially Annibale, in draw-
ing. They were eclectics and attempted to combine the purity of the ancients and
Raphael, the knowledge of Michelangelo, the riches and abundance of the Vene-
tian School, especially of Paolo, with the joyousness of Correggio’s Lombardian
brushwork. Domenichino, Guido, Guercino, and Albano learned in the school of
Agostino and Annibale and attained the same fame as their masters, but must be
considered to be imitators.6
Winckelmann explained that the Carracci sought to combine in their paintings the
best stylistic features of Raphael, Michelangelo, Correggio, the Venetians (especial-
ly Veronese), and the Lombard painters. He must have been thinking of Agostino’s
sonnet, because there are obvious similarities to the sources of inspiration named by
Agostino.
In addition to this sonnet, however, there existed an entire lineage of artistic
writing that acknowledged the Carracci in a similar way, and which could well have
sparked Winckelmann’s interest. Although Winckelmann borrowed the term from
philosophy and applied it to artistic creation, it may be assumed that he sought to
refer to what was already common knowledge about the Carracci’s connection to
their classical predecessors, especially to the great masters of the sixteenth century.
6 ‘Beynahe funfzig Jahre nach dem Raphael fieng die Schule der Caracci an zu blühen, deren Stifter Ludwig,
der Äeltere von ihnen, nur auf vierzehen Tage Rom sah, und folglich seinen Enkeln, sonderlich dem Hannibal,
in der Zeichnung nicht beykommen konnte. Diese waren Eclectici, und suchten die Reinheit der Alten und
des Raphaels, das Wissen des Michel Angelo, mit dem Reichthume und dem Ueberflusse der Venetianischen
Schule, sonderlich des Paolo, und mit der Fröhlichkeit des Lombardischen Pinsels im Correggio, zu vereinigen.’
Winckelmann, Kunsttheoretische Schriften X, p. 26. For the English translation, see Winckelmann, Johann
Joachim Winckelmann on Art, p. 163. For Winckelmann’s approach, see also Potts Alex, ‘Political Attitudes and
the Rise of Historicism in Art Theory’, pp. 193–194.
Criticism 163
Among these earlier writers was Rogier de Piles, whose dissertation on the works
of the most famous painters (1681) acknowledged Annibale Carracci’s use of many
styles in his painting. For de Piles, Annibale’s most outstanding characteristic was his
ability to combine in his art the good artistic qualities of all other painters.7 He men-
tioned the three main schools of painting—those of Rome, Venice, and Lombardy. In
his Abrégé de la vie des peintres, de Piles similarly expressed his respect for Annibale’s
universal acclaim.8 Another French writer, Louis-François Dubois de Saint-Gelais,
wrote in 1727 that the three Carracci formed a school and were able to promote art at
a time when it was in decline. He described Annibale’s style as building on Correggio
and Titian, as well as on Michelangelo and the antique.9
In England, the Carracci painters’ well-known assemblage of different styles was
appreciated by Jonathan Richardson in his Discourse on the Dignity, Certainty, Plea-
sure and Advantage, of the Science of a Connoisseur (1719). Summarizing the main
characters of the most important schools of painting, Richardson stressed the
strength and weakness of each school while singling out the Bolognese, who had
managed to assemble together in their art the unique traits of each and every oth-
er school. As Richardson clearly states, for him the most obvious characteristic of
Bolognese painting is the combination of many styles, as championed by Annibale
Carracci:
The Painters of the Roman School were the Best Designers, and had more of the
Antique Taste in their Works than any of the Others, but generally they were not
good Colourists; Those of Florence were good Designers, and had a Kind of Great-
ness, but ‘twas not Antique. The Venetian, and Lombard Schools had Excellent
Colourists, and a certain Grace but entirely Modern, especially those of Venice; but
their Drawing was generally Incorrect, and their Knowledge in History, and the
Antique very little: And the Bolognese School is a sort of Composition of the Oth-
ers; even Annibale himself possessed not any Part of Painting in the Perfection as
is to be seen in those from whom His Manner is compos’d, tho’ to make amends he
possessed more Parts than perhaps any Other Master, and in a very high Degree.10
7 ‘Et le Carache, pour son genie dans les compositions, pour ca façon d’orner riche & majestueuse, pour son
grand goust, sa facilité & sa correction dans le Dessein, & pour s’estre fait une maniere de toutes les bonnes qui
estoient avant luy.’ de Piles, Dissertation sur les ouvrages des plus fameux peintres, p. 21.
8 ‘Cependant nous ne voïons point de Peintre qui ait été plus universel, plus facile, ni plus assuré dans tout
ce qu’il faisoit, ni qui ait eu une approbation plus generale qu’Annibal.’ de Piles, Abrégé de la vie des peintres
avec des reflexions sur leurs ouvrages, p. 305.
9 ‘Au reste les trois Carraches furent si unis, qu’ils n’ont composé qu’une seule Ecole, qui ne les a pas moins
immortalisés que leurs propres Ouvrages, & ils ont eu la gloire de soutenir la Peinture qui commençoit à
décliner, quand ils vinrent au monde.’ Dubois de Saint-Gelais, Description des tableaux du Palais Royal, p. 31.
10 Richardson, Two Discourses, pp. 78–79.
Winckelmann was thus not original in his perception that the Carracci used a meth-
od of picking and choosing. Rather, his originality lies in his use of the term eclectici
for what he perceived as their artistic method. Winckelmann’s short text about sen-
sibility and its importance for defining and acknowledging the beautiful includes
two other important observations: first, he distinguished between the two Carracci
who came to Rome—Annibale and Agostino, whom he described as imitators of the
Greeks11—and the third Carracci, Ludovico, who remained in Bologna. For Winckel-
mann, Rome was home to the world’s most beautiful art, and it was therefore clear
to him that Ludovico could not have taken in all of this beauty during his short, two-
week stay in the eternal city.
Winckelmann’s second observation concerns the distinction between Annibale
and his older brother and their Bolognese pupils and successors: Domenichino, Reni,
Albani, and Guercino. For Winckelmann the members of this second generation
of Bolognese painters were selective imitators of the Carracci,12 yet this view does
not imply that he did not appreciate their work. In his Reflexions on the Imitation
of the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks (first published in 1755), for instance, he
expressed admiration for Reni’s Archangel St. Michael (Figure 5) due to its ‘grandeur
of expression, emphasizing the kind of sublime and majestic tranquility, that over-
comes pain and misery and shows greatness: Guido’s Angel, after having overthrown
the fiend of God and man, hovers over him unruffled and undismayed.’13
In writing about the Carracci, Winckelmann employed what he thought was the
best term to explain their practice of combining different styles, without elaborating
further upon this term. However, we may assume that his understanding of it derived
from the writings of such distinguished eighteenth-century thinkers as Johann Jacob
Brucker (1742/4) and Denis Diderot (1755). In his 1988 article on the history of eclecti-
cism, Pierluigi Donini expressed his view that Diderot’s perception of the term owed
much to Brucker’s definition of it.14 Writing about philosophy, Brucker commented:
The true Eclectic philosopher, renouncing every prejudice in favour of celebrated

names or ancient sects, makes reason his sole guide, and diligently investigates
the nature and properties of the objects which come under his observation, that
he may from these deduce clear principles, and arrive at certain knowledge. He
esteems nothing so disgraceful in philosophy, as jurare in verba magistri, implicitly
to acknowledge the authority of a master; and says, with respect to all the different
sects and their leaders, Tros Rutulusve fuat nullo discrimine habebo.15
11 Winckelmann, Reflections on the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks, p. 53.

12 Winckelmann, Johann Joachim Winckelmann on Art, Architecture, and Archaeology, p. 163.
13 Winckelmann, Reflections on the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks, p. 37.
14 Donini, ‘The History of the Concept of Eclecticism’, p. 19. For Brucker, see Schneider, ‘The Problem of
Eclecticism’, pp. 117–129.
15 Brucker, The History of Philosophy, p. 579. See also Schneider, ‘The Problem of Eclecticism’, pp. 118–120.
Criticism 165
In the entry ‘Eclectisme’ for his encyclopédie, Diderot provided a long and detailed
definition of the different eclectic schools, and of what constituted an eclectic phi-
losopher. As he writes at the beginning of his entry:
The eclectic is a philosopher who, trampling underfoot prejudice, tradition, antiq-

uity, general agreement, authority—in a word, everything that controls the minds
of the common herd—dares to think for himself, returns to the clearest general
principles, examines them, discusses them, admits nothing that is not based on the
testimony of his experience and his reason; and from all the philosophies he has
analyzed without respect and bias he makes for himself a particular and domestic
one which belongs to him.16
From the point of view of this study, what seems important is the question of what
in Brucker’s and Diderot’s definitions could have stimulated Winckelmann to attach
the term ‘eclecticism’ to the Carracci. Brucker and Diderot both regarded the eclectic
method as selective, sophisticated, and universal. They expected philosophers to be
independent in their research and study, critical in their choices, and unattached to
any philosophical authority or school. In their perception of eclecticism, both writ-
ers established a clear and distinctive framework that could encompass the artistic
methods employed in Bologna. As already noted, Malvasia quotes Ludovico as hav-
ing warned Annibale not to imitate a single master, but rather to choose from among
the great masters of the past. Perhaps this very statement stimulated Winckelmann,
who must have read Malvasia, to attribute the concept to Annibale. Such an attribu-
tion fit well with a sensitive understanding of the Bolognese painters, as well as with
Malvasia’s acknowledgement of their independent, thoughtful, and unprejudiced
methods of learning from their predecessors while combining different styles in a
single painting.
In his new classification of the Bolognese school of painting, Winckelmann was
merely trying to define the stylistic approach of a group of painters in accordance
with his own artistic preferences. Yet the term that he borrowed from philosophy,
combined with his aesthetic predilection for Greek art and his insistence on the need
to imitate it, had a tremendous influence on the status of the Bolognese painters,
as selection, combination, and imitation came to be associated and blended into a
single notion.
16 ‘L’eclectique est un philosophe qui foulant aux piés le préjugé, la tradition, l’ancienneté, le consentement
universel, l’autorité, en un mot tout ce qui subjuge la foule des esprits, ose penser de lui-même, remonter
aux principes généreux les plus clairs, les examiner, les discuter, n’dmettre rien que sur le témoignage de son
expérience & de sa raison; & de toutes les philosophies qu’il a analysées sans égard & sans partialité, s’en faire
une particuliere & domestique qui lui appartienne.’ Diderot, ‘Eclectisme’, p. 270. For the English translation,
see Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 74.
In his idea of imitation, Winckelmann was not alone. The eighteenth century wit-
nessed a surge of interest in the Platonic definition of art as mimesis, while endow-
ing imitation with a positive value. Charles Batteux, for example, stressed in his Les
Beaux Arts reduits a un même principe (1746) that a painting was an imitation of the
visible that had nothing to do with what was real or truthful.17 A painting, he argued,
was an imitative endeavour, and the painter’s task was to transmit his own percep-
tions or translations of what he saw and thought onto his canvas with the help of his
colours.18 Batteux also repeated the traditional theoretical idea about the importance
of combining the best parts from nature in order to create the ideal painting.
Winckelmann’s enthusiasm toward the Bolognese painters resonated throughout
the eighteenth century and the early nineteenth century. It is reflected, for example,
in Matthew Pilkington’s highly popular Dictionary of Painters, which was first pub-
lished in 1770 and continued to be republished until 1857. Pilkington underscored
the fame of the Carracci, as well as their reliance on numerous predecessors in defin-
ing their styles. Writing about Annibale Carracci, he stated: ‘no painter seems to
have been more universal, easy, or certain in every thing he did, nor more generally
approved than Annibale.’ Ludovico Carracci. Pilkington said, achieved his greatness
‘by studying the works of Titian, Tintoretto, and Paolo Veronese, at Venice; of Passig-
nano, and Andrea del Sarto, at Florence; of Giulio Romano at Mantua; and of Parme-
giano [sic], and Corregio [sic], at Parma’.19
The English painter Joshua Reynolds similarly praised the Carracci academy, call-
ing it ‘the truly great Academical Bolognian school’.20 He regarded Ludovico Carrac-
ci’s paintings as ‘the nearest to perfection’,21 due to his skill in colouring and creating
light and shade in a manner that nevertheless did not draw one’s attention away from
the painting’s subject. Yet Reynolds later criticized the Carracci method as being too
technical and lacking inspiration, and he found that the celestial parts of their paint-
ings should have been more imaginative. The Carracci, Reynolds argued,
adopted the mechanical part with sufficient success. But the divine part which
addresses itself to the imagination, as possessed by Michael Angelo [sic] or Tibaldi,
was beyond their grasp: they formed, however, a most respectable school, a style
17 ‘Qu’est-ce que la Peinture? Une imitation des objets visible. Elle n’a rien de reel, rien de vrai, tout est
phantôme chez elle, & sa perfection ne dépend que de sa ressemblance avec la réalité’. Batteux, Les Beaux Arts
reduits a un même principe, p. 14.
18 ‘Et si le Génie, par caprice, fait de ces parties un assemblage contraire aux loix naturelles, en degradant
la Nature, il se degrade lui-même, & se change en une espéce de folie’. Batteux, Les Beaux Arts reduits a un
même principe, p. 8. This is a continuation of the theory discussed above, in which the Zeuxis story is repeated.
For the story of Zeuxis in Batteux’s text, see Batteux, Les Beaux Arts reduits a un même principe, p. 24. For the
persistence of this theory of the ideal in the French academy of the eighteenth century, see Morgan, ‘Concepts
of Abstraction’, p. 670.
19 See Pilkington, A General Dictionary of Painters, I, pp. 167–168.
20 For Reynolds’ praise of the Carracci academy, see Reynolds, Discourses, p. 273.
21 For Reynolds’ appreciation of Ludovico in particular, see Reynolds, Discourses, p. 32.
Criticism 167
more on the level, and calculated to please a greater number; and if excellence of
this kind is to be valued according to the number, rather than the weight and qual-
ity of admirers, it would assume even an higher rank in art.22
John Gustavus Lemaistre, who visited Italy during the one year of peace that fol-
lowed the Ameins treaty of 1803, devoted an entire chapter to Bologna, and especially
to the paintings that were still there at the time, in his Travels after the Peace of Amiens:
Through Parts of France, Switzerland, Italy, and Germany (London, 1806). He was enthu-
siastic about the richness of the art that he saw in Bologna, rating it as one of the most
important cities where one could still find the works of the great masters. He concen-
trated on the work of local painters, mainly the great masters of the Bolognese school
of painting in the late sixteenth century and first half of the seventeenth century:
It has been remarked by former travelers, that the places of Bologna cannot vie
with those of Genoa, either in point of architecture or of tasteful decoration, but
if the buildings here be less magnificent, the pictures are infinitely more beautiful:
and I do not think, if we except Rome, Paris, and Dresden, that any town in Europe
possesses so vast and rich a collection of originals by the first masters.23
Writing about the Bolognese school of painting in The Italian School of Painting: with
observation on the present state of the art (1820), John Thomas James stated: ‘They
professed, however, to combine with this a knowledge of all the peculiar excellencies
which are to be found in the works of their predecessors.’24 Four years later, in 1824,
William Buchanan defined the Bolognese style as ‘the perfection of art’.25
Although he remained quite neutral with regard to eclecticism, it is also worth
mentioning the renowned German art historian Gustav Friedrich Waagen, whose
detailed account of the paintings he studied in England was written in the form of
letters. In mentioning Annibale’s Pietà with the Three Maries (The National Gallery,
London), he assumed this painting to be representative of what he called the ‘eclec-
tic system’, a term he used to designate a combination of styles based on recognized
sources of influence. For Waagen, such a painting was eclectic if the painter com-
bined, for instance, the colouring of Correggio with that of Palma Vecchio.26 Else-
where in the same account, he similarly acknowledged a Rest on the Flight to Egypt
by Annibale as a composition in which St. Joseph was an imitation of Michelangelo,
whereas St. John owed much to Raphael.27
22 See, Reynolds, Discourses, p. 274.

23 Lemaistre, Travels after the Peace of Amiens, I, pp. 307–308.
24 James, The Italian Schools of Painting, p. 216.
25 Buchanan, Memoirs of Painting, p. 75.
26 Waagen, Treasures of Art in Great Britain, III, p. 324.
27 Waagen, Treasures of Art in Great Britain, III, p. 190.
Winckelmann’s application of the term to artistic creation, and especially to the

paintings of the Carracci, persisted until the end of the eighteenth century, without
diminishing the admiration towards Bolognese painting.
The Nineteenth-Century juste milieu
The nineteenth-century understanding of eclecticism was complex, mainly due

to its pervasiveness on so many levels within an emerging modern society. Think-
ers were fascinated by the inclusive, universal aspects of eclecticism, as found in
numerous facets of modern creativity and culture. In France, especially, the ideolo-
gy that developed in the early nineteenth century, gaining prominence under Lou-
is Phillip’s constitutional monarchy, had eclectic characteristics. Despite its pop-
ularity, however, eclecticism was also criticized from its very inception, and this
criticism persisted throughout the entire century. Given France’s political climate,
in which liberal, republican, royalist, and clerical ideas were pulling in opposing
directions, eclecticism was viewed as an attempt to find a ‘right path’ for unifica-
tion and to bridge the gaps between traditionalists and progressivists.28 The terms
associated with this political understanding of eclecticism were compromise and
balance.
Eclecticism was also associated with another term that gained popularity in the
first half of the nineteenth century—the juste milieu (middle way). This term pen-
etrated all aspects of French political life and culture, as manifested, for example,
by the French philosopher Pierre-Simon Ballanche’s call for a political synthesis as
well as reconciliation, mediation, moderation, and adjustment. In his Essais sur les
institutions sociales, Ballanche stressed the mutual interests of different factions of
French society to accepting and combining different and opposing views for the
purpose of French reunification.29 The most vigorous advocacy of this approach
took place within the French Academy and was represented above all by Victor
Cousin, a professor of philosophy at the Sorbonne, who wrote the following as early
as 1817:
what I recommend is an enlightened eclecticism, which, judging with equity, and

even with benevolence, all schools, borrows from them what they possess of the
28 The literature on nineteenth-century French approach of the juste milieu is vast. I used Albert Boime’s
explanation of the emergence of French eclecticism from a political point of view. See Boime, Thomas Couture
and the Eclectic Vision, pp. 3–10. See also Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 66.
29 ‘Maintenant, éclairés par des experiences des plus d’un genre, et rendus à notre véritable existence sociale,
convenons qu’il n’y a qu’un moyen de réunir tous les partis; c’est de sentir les raisons de tous, de condescendre
à toutes les opinions, de ne point s’attaquer mutuellement avec les armes toujours inconvenantes de l’ironie ou
du sarcasme, de se mettre à la place de tous les intérets.’ Ballanche, Essais sur les institutions sociales, II, p. 32.
Criticism 169
true, and neglects what in them is false. Since the spirit of party has hitherto suc-
ceeded so ill with us, let us try the spirit of conciliation.30
Cousin, continued with a clear notion of the juste milieu, by emphasizing compromise:
It is, doubtless, just, it is of the highest utility, to discriminate in each system what
there is true in it from what there is false in it; first, in order to appreciate this
system rightly; then, in order to render the false of no account, to disengage and
re-collect the true, and thus to enrich and aggrandize philosophy by history.31
Cousin, who according to Patricia Mainardi was the most influential philosopher in
the first half of the century, advocated for an open, universal approach that would
embrace all schools of philosophy, finding in each its unique truth.32 Open-minded-
ness, he stressed, was an important and even crucial trait of an eclectic method. The
more one is able to acknowledge new, different, and varied styles and directions, the
more possibilities one has available. The same approach is discernible in the sections
that he devoted to painting. His Romantic tendencies are clear: Cousin wrote about
the artist as a genius, who interprets nature rather than imitating it.33 However, he
argued that the artist’s distinction between different aspects of nature and his choice
about the right way to depict it would result in the composition of beauty, while the
wrong choices would produce monstrosity.34 For Cousin, a work of art was a com-
bination of visible beauty and the expression of a moral idea. Cousin expressed his
admiration for seventeenth-century French culture and appreciated the paintings of
Eustache Le Sueur and Nicholas Poussin, comparing both painters to Raphael.35 Writ-
ing about Le Sueur’s Descent from the Cross (Figure 36), he noted that ‘all the parts of
art are there in the service of expression […] as if Lesueur [sic] had wished to bring
together in it all the powers of his soul, all the resources of his talent’.36 For Cousin,
30 ‘ce que je recommande, c’est un éclectisme éclairé qui, jugeant avec équité et même avec bienveillance
toutes les écoles, leur emprunte ce qu’elles ont de vrai, et néglige ce qu’elles ont de faux. Puisque l’esprit de
parti nous a si mal réussi jusqu’à présent essayons de l’esprit de conciliation.’ Cousin, Du vrai, du beau, et du
bien, p. 12. Cousin, Lectures on the True, the Beautiful, and the Good, p. 33.
31 ‘Il est juste sans doute, il est de la plus haute utilité de bien discerner dans chaque système ce qu’il a de
vrai d’avec ce qu’il a de faux, d’abord pour bien apprécier ce système, ensuite pour rendre le faux au néant,
dégager et recueillir le vrai et ainsi enrichir et agrandir la philosophie par l’histoire.’ Cousin, Du vrai, du beau,
et du bien, pp. 16–17. For the English translation, see Cousin, Lectures on the True, the Beautiful, and the Good,
pp. 35–36. For Cousin’s eclectic method, see his discussion on pages 12–19. For Cousin’s compromise approach,
see also Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 74.
32 All eclectics must be open to variety. See Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 9 and pp. 254–255. See
also Mainardi, Art and Politics of the Second Empire, p. 69.
33 Cousin, Du vrai, du beau, et du bien, p. 186; Cousin, Lectures on the True, the Beautiful, and the Good, p. 155.
36 ‘Toutes les parties de l’art y sont au service de l’expression […] comme si Lesueur eût voulu rassembler ici
toutes les puissances de son âme, toutes les ressources de son talent!’ Cousin, Du vrai, du beau, et du bien, p.
238. Cousin, Lectures on the True, the Beautiful, and the Good, p. 191.
Figure 36: Eustache Le Sueur, Descent from the Cross, 1651, Louvre, Paris (Photo: © RMN-Grand Palais (musée du
Louvre) / Gérard Blot).
Le Sueur was the painter of sentiment, while Poussin was the painter of thought.37
Writing about the different schools of art, Cousin remarked:
There is not one of these schools that does not represent in its own way some side
of the beautiful, and we are disposed to embrace all in an impartial and kindly
study. We are eclectics in the arts as well as in metaphysics. […] What we demand
of the different schools, without distinction of time or place, what we see in the
south as well as in the north, at Florence, Rome, Venice, and Seville, as well as at
Antwerp, Amsterdam, and Paris, – wherever there are men, is something human, is
the expression of a sentiment or an idea.’38
37 ‘Si Lesueur est le peintre du sentiment, le Poussin est celui de la pensée.’ Cousin, Du vrai, du beau, et du
bien, p. 239; Cousin, Lectures on the True, the Beautiful, and the Good, p. 192.
38 ‘Il n’y a pas une de ces écoles qui ne représente à sa manière quelque côté du beau, et nous sommes bien
d’avis de les embrasser toutes dans une étude impartiale et bienveillante. Nous sommes éclectiques dans les
arts aussi bien qu’en métaphysique. […] Ce que nous demandons aux diverses écoles, sans distinction de
temps ni de lieu, ce que nous cherchons au midi comme au nord, à Florance, à Rome, et à Séville, comme à
Anvers, à Amsterdam et à Paris, partout où il y a des hommes, c’est quelque chose d’humain, c’est l’expression
Criticism 171
According to the noted scholar of nineteenth-century French art Albert Boime,

Cousin influenced important French writers such as Honoré de Balzac, Gustave Flau-
bert, and Victor Hugo. With regard to Hugo, Boime emphasized that his aim was to
harmonize oppositions, combining comedy and tragedy for the sake of expressing
a true drama.39 Hugo’s acknowledgment of both classicism and Romantic innova-
tion constituted a decidedly eclectic approach to writing in the first half of the nine-
teenth century. In artistic terms, according to Boime, eclecticism was the bridge that
had to be built between the Neo-classicists and the Romantics.40 This bridge found
its most coherent expression in the Exposition universelle that was held in Paris in
1855, with 5000 works of art from around the world (28 countries) and four retro-
spective exhibitions of the main protagonists of French painting: the Neo-classicist
artist Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres, the Romantic artist Eugène Delacroix, as well
as Alexandre-Gabriel Decamps and Horace Vernet.41
Cousin’s eclectic approach was also followed by the French novelist Stendhal, who
repeated his universal ideas concerning the discovery of the true path in varied phil-
osophical methods.42 Especially interesting for this study is the fact that Stendhal was
one of the most erudite and enthusiastic admirers of the Bolognese painters, praising
the Carracci, Domenichino, Reni, and Guercino in his numerous writings. He recog-
nized in them a rebellious attitude that he compared to that of nineteenth-century
Romantics. In his Écoles Italiennes de peinture, he positively stressed the Carracci
attempt to unite all that is great in the other schools of paintings, and their related
use of different styles in a single work of art.43 Among the paintings he mentioned was
Annibale’s Madonna and Child Enthroned with St. John the Baptist, St. John the Evange-
list and St. Catherine of Alexandria (Plate 8), which was discussed in Chapter Three.
Stendhal wrote that in this painting one could see Annibale’s adherence to Ludovico’s
method, after a long period in which he exclusively imitated Correggio’s style. Stend-
hal’s description of Annibale’s eclectic approach followed Lanzi’s similar description
of the painting as a combination of styles,44 with the Madonna painted in the style
d’un sentiment ou d’une idée.’ Cousin, Du vrai, du beau, et du bien, pp. 220–221. Cousin, Lectures on the True,
the Beautiful, and the Good, pp. 178–179.
39 Boime, Thomas Couture and the Eclectic Vision, pp. 15–19.
40 Boime, Thomas Couture and the Eclectic Vision, p. 9.
41 Mainardi, Art and Politics of the Second Empire, pp. 33–113. See also Trapp, ‘The Universal Exhibition
of 1855’, pp. 300–305; Shelton, ‘Ingres versus Delacroix’, pp. 726–728. For Vernet’s display at the Exposition
universelle, see Thoma, ‘Writing History’, pp. 90–103, especially, pp. 98–101.
42 Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 81.
43 ‘Il s’y prirent de deux manières pour parvenir à cet objet: tantôt ils présentaient diverse styles dans les
diverse personnages d’un tableau.’ Stendhal, Écoles Italiennes de peinture, III, pp. 12–13.
44 Luigi Lanzi drew a comparison with methods used in poetry: ‘Their [the Carracci] object was to collect
into one whatever they found most valuable in other schools, and in this process they observed two methods.
The first resembles that of the poets, who, in several canzoni, propose different models for imitation; in one, for
instance, borrowing from Petrarch, in another from Chiabrera, in a third from Frugoni. […] Thus the Caracci,
in some of their compositions, were accustomed to present different styles in a variety of different figures.
Figure 37: Paul Delaroche, Hémicycle des Beaux-arts, 1837/41, École des Beaux-Arts, Paris (Photo: © Beaux-Arts de
Paris, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / image Beaux-arts de Paris).
of Veronese, baby Jesus and John the Baptist in the style of Correggio, John the Evan-
gelist in the style of Titian, and St. Catherine in the style of Parmigianino.45 In his
description of the Lambertini frescoes in San Domenico (discussed above in Chapter
Two), Stendhal stressed the stylistic differences evident between the depiction of the
two saints and the figure of Charity. While the saints were vigorously and moderately
depicted to provoke the most profound and austere sentiments, the delicate figure of
Charity was portrayed with great attention and with a perfect finishing.46
[…] Annibal too, who had long admired only Coreggio, having finally adopted Lodovico’s maxim, painted his
celebrated picture for the church of St. George, where, in his figure of the Virgin, he imitated Paolo; in that of
the Divine Infant and St. John, Correggio; in St. John the Evangelist he exhibited Titian; and in the very graceful
form of St. Catherine, the sweetness of Parmigianino.’ Lanzi, The History of Painting in Italy, III, pp. 70–71.
‘Aurian voluto recare insieme quanto nelle altre scuole vedean di meglio; e in ciò tennero essi due vie. La prima
è simile a que’ poeti, che in separate canzoni si propongono diversi esemplari, e in una per figura ritraggono
dal Petrarca, in altra dal Chiabrera, in altra dal Frugoni. […] Non altramente i Caracci usarono in certe lor
composizioni di presentare in diverse figure diversi stili. […] Così Annibale, che per qualche tempo non mirava
se non il Coreggio, adottata in fine la massima di Lodovico, dipinse la tavola celebre per S. Giorgio; ove nella
gran Vergine imitò Paolo, nel divino Infante e nel S. Giovannino si propose il Coreggio, in S. Gio. Evangelista fece
veder Tiziano, nella graziosissima S. Caterina il Parmigianino.’ Lanzi, Storia pittorica della Italia, II, p. 77.
45 ‘Annibale qui, pendant quelque temps, ne chercha à imiter que le Corrège, ayant enfin adopté la maxime
de Louis, peignit son célèbre tableau pour l’église de Saint-Georges, où l’on voit que dans la figure de Marie, il a
imité Paul Véronèse; dans l’enfant divin et le petit saint Jean, le Corrège; dans saint Jean l’Evangéliste, le Titien;
et dans cette sainte Catherine où l’on trouve tant de grâce, le Parmesan.’ Stendhal, Écoles Italiennes de peinture,
III, p. 13.
46 ‘Dans l’un de ces tableaux, Louis avait présenté saint Dominique et saint François d’une manière toutes
facile en appearence, avec peu de lumières et peu d’ombres, mais les unes et lea autres vigoureuses. Les
vêtements avaient peu de plis, les figures présentaient les sentiments les plus austères et les plus profonds
que puisse imprimer à des hommes pieux la crainte de l’enfer./ Vis-à-vis, il avait peint la charité avec tant de
délicatesse, des grâces si suaves et un fini si parfait et par là si éloigné de la sécheresse, que cette fresque fut
toujours le modèle des plus grands élèves des Carrache.’ Stendhal, Écoles Italiennes de peinture, III, p. 61.
Criticism 173
Stendhal, according to Jean Seznec, had a special weakness for Guercino, and
admired his ability to induce in his figures feelings and emotions. Seznec suggested
that the figure of Julien Sorel was based on that of St. William in Guercino’s paint-
ing St. William of Aquitaine in front of Pope Gregory VII (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Bolo-
gna), and that the composition could well have been titled The Red and the Black, like
Stendhal’s famous book.47
Cousin’s ideas also found resonance in the artistic development of the nine-
teenth-century painter Paul Delaroche, who was commissioned to decorate the
Hemicycle auditorium at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. From 1837 to 1841, he
depicted 75 figures that were chosen to summarize the historical progression of artis-
tic creation on the auditorium’s wall (Figure 37). Delaroche represented neither the
Carracci nor Guido Reni and Guercino; the only painter from Bologna who received
recognition in his composition was Domenichino, Annibale’s most loyal student. It is
interesting to note, however, that Delaroche combined different styles in his depic-
tions of the figures, in accordance with the eclectic approach evident in Bolognese
painting. Boime distinguished between Delaroche’s portrayal of the Romantics and
the Classicists, the colourists and the draughtsmen, noting that: ‘Delaroche took
the liberty of using a more brilliant palette and freer brushwork in the section of
the colourists than in that of the dessinateur.’48 Delaroche selected this approach
at a time when the dichotomy between Ingres and Delacroix—that is, the polarity
between line and colour—was at its height.49 In doing so, he followed the same type
47 ‘le vrai titre de la toile de Guerchin, c’est Le Rouge et le Noir’. Seznec, ‘Stendhal et les peintres Bolonais’,
pp. 175–176.
48 Boime, Thomas Couture and the Eclectic Vision, p. 58.
49 For the rivalry between Ingres and Delacroix, see Shelton, ‘Ingres Versus Delacroix’, pp. 726–742. Shelton
(p. 734) sees Delaroche as a painter of the juste milieu. One should note that in the Hemicycle decoration the
painter used a different approach, retaining a non-assimilated attitude rather than the reconciled approach
characteristic of the juste milieu.
of differentiation between disegno and colore that was used by Guido Reni for the
inverse purpose of enhancing the connection between these two stylistic aspects, as
discussed in Chapter Two. Delaroche is also known to have created an earlier paint-
ing titled Death of Agostino Carracci (1825).50
Although the approach represented by the juste milieu is eclectic by definition, it
differs from the theoretical underpinnings of seventeenth-century Bolognese paint-
ing in its attempt to neutralize styles, which is far removed from the attempts of the
Carracci and their followers to combine stylistic elements in order to underscore,
for example, the separation between the celestial and the terrestrial realms. Yet this
discussion is important for understanding the shift in attitude toward the Bolognese
painters as it developed in the nineteenth century based on a new and derogatory
perception of the term. The valorization of compromise characteristic of the juste
milieu was attached to the artistic methods of the Carracci, influencing the manner
in which they were perceived and criticized.
The notion of a juste milieu may explain the emergence of the group of Romantic
writers, who similarly came to the fore in the early nineteenth century. Although
they belonged to the same theoretical camp as Cousin and Stendhal in terms of their
views on art and culture, this group of Romantic writers rejected eclecticism, which
they associated with Winckelmann’s praise of the Greeks and his view that the ulti-
mate goal of painters should be to imitate their work.51 Winckelmann’s definition
of the Carracci as eclectics, as well as the reading of Agostino’s Sonnet as an artistic
theory, were seen as representing this same artistic ideal, and thus had a devastating
influence on the popularity of the Bolognese school of painting.
This negative perception of the Carracci in the nineteenth century began with
the Swiss-born Romantic Henry Fuseli. Fuseli translated into English Winckelmann’s
book Reflections on the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks (1765), which included
the essay ‘On the Imitation of the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks’. In 1801, in
one of his lectures delivered at the Academy of Art in London and published in The
Scots Magazine, he criticized what he called the painters of ‘the eclectic school’ for
their mechanical attempts to select the best components of the great masters of the
past and unite them in a single work of art:
50 Agostino’s painting is now lost. The following citation is a description of the painting from 1857: ‘La Mort
d’ Augustin Carrache […] Couché sur un grabat, Augustin Carrache est à l’agonie. A ses côtés, on voit deux
disciples du maître qui l’entourent en exprimant leur profonde douleur, tandis que des moines arrivent pour
lui présenter un crucifix. Sur un chevalet repose un tableau que le peintre célèbre va laisser inachevé. Peint en
1825. Signé Delà roche jeune. Exposé en 1826 à la galerie Lebrun.’ Goddé, Explication des tableaux, p. 3. See also
Boime, Thomas Couture and the Eclectic Vision, p. 53.
51 Winckelmann’s idea, as Fuseli wrote, goes as follows: ‘There is but one way for the moderns to become
great, and perhaps unequalled; I mean, by imitating the antients.’ He adds: ‘The idea of unity and perfection,
which he acquired in meditating on antiquity, will help him to combine, and to ennoble the more scattered
and weaker beauties of our Nature. Thus he will improve every beauty he discovers in it, and by comparing
the beauties of nature with the ideal, form rules for himself.’ Winckelmann, Reflections on the Painting and
Sculpture of the Greeks, p. 2 and pp. 19–20.
Criticism 175
Such was the state of art, when, towards the decline of the sixteenth century,
Ludovico Carracci, with his cousins Agostino and Annibale, founded at Bologna
that ecclectic school which by selecting the beauties, correcting the faults, sup-
plying the defects and avoiding the extremes of the different styles, attempted to
form a perfect system. But as the mechanic part was their only object, they did
not perceive that the projected union was incompatible with the leading principle
of each master. Let us hear this plan from Agostino Carracci himself, as it is laid
down in his sonnet on the ingredients required to form a perfect painter, if that
may be called a sonnet, which has more the air of medical prescription. ‘Take,’ says
Agostino, ‘the design of Rome, Venetian motion and shade, the dignified tone of
Lombardy’s colour, the terrible manner of Micheal Angelo [sic], the just symmetry
of Raphael, Titiano’s [sic] truth of nature, and the sovereign purity of Correggio’s
style: add to these the decorum and solidity of Tibaldi, the learned invention of
Primaticcio, and a little of Parmegiano’s [sic] grace: but to save so much study, such
weary labour, apply your imitation to the works which our dear Nicolo has left us
here.’ Of such advice, balanced between the tone of regular breeding and the cant
of an empiric, what could be the result? Excellence or mediocrity? Who ever imag-
ined that a multitude of dissimilar threads could compose an uniform texture, that
dissemination of spots would make masses, or a little of many things produce a
legitimate whole? Indiscriminate imitation must end in the extinction of charac-
ter, and that in mediocrity—the cypher of art.52
Fuseli was highly critical of the attempt, as described in Agostino’s sonnet, to com-
bine different forms taken from the great masters of the past, viewing this approach
as an empirical method that leads to mediocrity. He denounced what he perceived
to be the Carracci method as an impossible system, and he described the attempt to
balance the unique characteristics of the various schools and painters mentioned in
Agostino’s sonnet as an inconceivable prescription. This conciliation of styles con-
tradicted his Romantic ideal of the artistic genius, who was motivated by a deep need
to express his uncontrolled feelings and thoughts. For art lovers of the Romantic era
such as Fuseli, the gathering of stylistic elements from a variety of sources and the
copying of models from nature or from other paintings was deemed to produce false
art. For those who valued art born of an inspired mind, eclecticism, as they under-
stood it, seemed too mechanical, logical, and calculated:
Such was the state of art, when the spirit of machinery, in submission to the van-
ities and upstart pride of papal nepotism, destroyed what yet was left of mean-
ing; when equilibration, contrast, grouping, engrossed composition, and poured a
deluge of gay common-place over the platfonds, pannels, and cupolas of palaces
52 Fuseli, Lectures on Painting, pp. 80–82.

and temples. Those who could not conceive a figure singly, scattered multitudes; to
count, was to be poor. The rainbow and the seasons were ransacked for the hues,
and every eye became the tributary of the great, but abused talents of Pietro da
Cortona, and the fascinating but debauched and empty facility of Luca Giordano.53
Several decades later, the German art historian Franz Kugler pointed in his Handbook
of Painting (1837) to the contradiction between the attempt to gather all the best
qualities of the great masters and the production of art:
The chief painters of this time (that is, the end of the sixteenth century and first
half of the seventeenth century) are known by the name of the Eclectics, from
their having endeavoured to select and unite the best qualities of each of the great
masters, without however excluding the study of nature. This eclectic aim, when
carried to an extreme, necessarily involves a great misconception; for the merit of
the earlier masters consisted strictly in their individual and peculiar qualities; the
endeavour, therefore, to combine characteristics essentially different was inher-
ently false.54
According to Kugler, the eclectic outlook of the Carracci and their followers was
bound to fail, and ultimately destroyed the art of painting. It led to the poverty and
mediocrity of Pietro da Cortona, whom he regarded as the founder of a new Manner-
ism, which ‘chiefly aimed at filling space with the least cost of labour’.55
Fuseli and Kugler, the most vigorous nineteenth-century critics of the Bolognese
painters, paved the way for the further expression of negative sentiments, leading to
the perception of the entire Bolognese School of painting as a form of false art. As
the painters affiliated with this school fell out of favour, the label ‘eclecticism’ and the
theory that it was associated with became a synonym for bad art.
Jacob Burckhardt’s Cicerone followed Kugler in dividing seventeenth-century art into
two groups: the eclectics, led by the Carracci in Bologna; and the naturalists, led by Cara-
vaggio in Rome and Naples. ‘Eclecticism’, Burckhardt wrote, ‘contains a contradiction in
53 Fuseli, Lectures on Painting, pp. 86–87.

54 ‘Man benennt den grössten Theil der Künstler dieser Zeit, am Ende des sechzehnten und in der ersten
Hälfte des siebzehnten Jahrhunderts gewöhnlich mit dem Namen der Eklektiker (Auswähler), insofern sie
nemlich aus den Werken der einzelnen grossen Meister ihre vorzüglichsten Eigenschaften herauszuziehen
und zu einem Ganzen zu vereinigen suchten (ohne dabei jedoch das Studium der Natura us den Augen zu
setzen). Natürlich liegt in dieser eklektischen Richtung, wenn sie auf die Spitze getrieben wird, ein grosser
Missverstand der eigentlichen künstlerischen Conception und Ausübung, indem jene älteren Meister gerade
in ihren besonderen Eigenthümlichkeiten gross waren, und innerlich Verschiedenartiges zu vereinen, schon
an sich ein Widerspruch ist.’ Kugler, Handbuch der Geschichte der Malerei, p. 331. For the English translation,
see Kugler, Handbook of Painting, II, p. 569.
55 ‘ein möglichst wohlfeiles Ausfüllen grosser Räume’. Kugler, Handbuch der Geschichte der Malerei, p. 350.
For the English translation, see Kugler, Handbook of Painting, II, p. 590.
Criticism 177
itself, if it is conceived as though the special qualities of Michelangelo, Raphael, Titian,

Correggio, were to be united in one work’.56 In her 1844 companion to the most celebrat-
ed private galleries in London, Anne Jameson further concluded that the Carracci had
great technical excellence, but a want of singleness and individuality of feeling, a

want of spiritual elevation; and while their productions are often delicate, graceful,
majestic, they seldom appeal to the higher faculties of the soul.57
Charles Baudelaire was reminded of the Bolognese in his critical description of the
Salon of 1846, and wrote about ‘the Carracci and the eclectic painters of the second
epoch’ as having ‘a solid manner, but little or no soul—no great faults, but no great
quality’.58 Baudelaire is an interesting case study due to his straightforward attack
on the use of eclecticism in painting, even though he himself practiced an eclectic
disposition by creating poetry in prose—that is, combining two literary genres into a
single creation. As already noted, in his description of the Salon of 1846, Baudelaire
wrote that ‘An eclectic is a ship which tries to sail before all four winds at once’,59 thus
alluding to the nineteenth-century emphasis on the conciliatory aspects of the term.
Therefore, he continued, ‘An eclectic’s work leaves no memory behind it’.
Writing a year later, in 1847, about the sonnet attributed to Agostino Carracci,
Ralph N. Wornum stated that it ‘appears to be wanting in critical acumen, indepen-
dent of its impracticability and mere technical tendency’.60 In a catalogue of Italian
painters published in 1855, Maria Farquhar presented the same line of thought when
she wrote of Annibale Carracci’s Galleria Farnese: ‘It is a great work, but is, aestheti-
cally, little more than an example of high technical skill.’ Farquhar regarded Ludovico
Carracci as the founder of the ‘Eclectic School of Bologna’, and was quite critical in
regard to the impossibility of following such a theoretical approach:
They professed to show how a painter might become perfect, by endeavouring to

acquire the respective excellencies of the various Capimaestri of the great Italian
schools. It is this selection from several which constitutes their Eclecticism. […]
Though such an attempt must ever be hopeless, as it reduces the art to simple
copying, and supposes all men to be similarly endowed.61
In his Painting Popularly Explained of 1864, Thomas John Gullick remarked

that ‘this endeavour to unite characteristics essentially different, at once implies a
56 Burckhardt, The Cicerone, p. 221.

57 Jameson, Companion to the Most Celebrated Private Galleries of Art in London, pp. 97–98.
58 Baudelaire, Art in Paris 1845–1862, p. 103.
59 Baudelaire, Art in Paris 1845–1862, p. 97.
60 Wornum, The Epochs of Painting Characterized, p. 372.
61 Farquhar, Biographical Catalogue of the Principal Italian Painters, p. 40.
contradiction; and the Carracci themselves certainly did not reduce their theory to
practice’.62 This outlook paved the way for the influential nineteenth-century art his-
torian John Ruskin to formulate his famously damning dictum: ‘There is no entirely
sincere or great art in the Seventeenth Century.’63
To these unfavourable attitudes toward the Carracci and toward seventeenth-cen-
tury painting more generally, one should add the views of eclecticism expressed by
Balzac and the English painter John Constable. Balzac expressed his objection to
eclecticism in Le Chef-d’oeuvre inconnu, a short story set in 1612, which entered his
Comédie Humaine in 1845. One of this story’s main protagonists—the old painter
Frenhofer—criticized, in the presence of the young Nicholas Pousin, as impossible
the attempt made by Porbus to ‘imitate Hans Holbein and Titian, Albrecht Dürer and
Paul Veronese in a single picture’, describing this attempt as follows:
Titian’s rich golden coloring poured into Albrecht Dürer’s austere outlines has
shattered them, like molten bronze bursting through the mould that is not strong
enough to hold it. In other places the outlines have held firm, imprisoning and
obscuring the magnificent glowing flood of Venetian color.
The outcome is that ‘traces of that unlucky indecision are to be seen everywhere’.64
Constable, meanwhile, distinguished between the Bolognese School’s historical paint-
ings and the landscape paintings produced by Annibale Carracci and Domenichino. He
maintained that while eclecticism was noticeable in the former genre, it was not discern-
ible in the latter. For Constable, the landscape painting of Annibale and Domenichino,
‘can not be so considered [eclectic], as each possesses a character of its own’.65 One may
understand Constable’s stylistic differentiation between Annibale and Domenichino’s
landscape paintings and the other types of painting they produced as an acknowledg-
ment of the different styles used by these artists, depending on their subject matter.
Constable thought that these two seventeenth-century painters could not be regarded as
eclectic, because their landscape paintings were unique and original. Implied in this view,
however, is his acceptance of Kugler’s notion that eclectic painting could not be original.
Eduard Zeller, the prolific German philosopher, reacted to eclecticism in the spirit
of Baudelaire’s account. At the beginning of his Philosophie der Griechen (1852), Zeller
defined the eclectic system as follows: ‘This “neither one nor another” (Weder-noch)
became in eclecticism “One as well as the other” (Sowohl-als-auch).’66 He expressed
his assessment of eclectic philosophy by stating the following:
62 Gullick, Painting Popularly Explained, p. 174.

63 Ruskin, Modern Painters, III, p. 337. See also Senkevitch, ‘The Critical Reception of the Bolognese School’,
p. 94.
64 Balzac, Le Chef-d’oeuvre inconnu, p. 42. For the English translation, see Balzac, The Quest of the Absolute, p. 228.
65 Editorial, ‘Painters on the Carracci’, p. 391.
66 ‘Dieses Weder Noch wird im Eklekticismus zum Sowohl Als Auch’. Zeller, Philosophie der Griechen, p. 320.
For the English translation, see Zeller, A History of Eclecticism, p. 4.
Criticism 179
If the truth which could be found in no individual system was to be gleaned out
of all systems, it required only moderate attention to perceive that the fragments
of various systems would not allow themselves to be so directly united—that each
philosophical proposition has its definite meaning only in its interconnection with
some definite system; while, on the other hand, propositions from different sys-
tems, like the systems themselves, mutually exclude one another: that the contra-
diction of opposite theories annuls their authority, and that the attempt to make a
basis out of the harmonising propositions of the philosophers, as recognized truth,
is wrecked on the fact of their disagreement.67
What seems to emerge from these negative approaches toward seventeenth-century

Bolognese painters and toward eclecticism is a general claim that the painters in
Bologna were trying to create a perfect yet impossible system, and that it is imprac-
tical to produce art that encompasses all the qualities of the best painters of earlier
generations. Fuseli pointed to the mediocrity of any attempt to select the beauti-
ful aspects of various styles while avoiding their extremes. Kugler argued that once
an imitator tried to duplicate a given part of an original artwork, it loses its origi-
nality. Both Burckhardt and Gullick reiterated this contradiction between duplica-
tion and originality, individuality, and peculiarity. Jameson stressed the Bolognese
painters’ lack of authentic sentiment. Balzac and Farquhar criticized the technical
impossibilities inherent in such an endeavour, and Wornum disapproved of their
impracticability.
In conclusion, Winckelmann’s classification of the Carracci as eclectics, his adher-
ence to Greek culture, and his call for imitating the artistic creations of the ancients
had a devastating impact on everything that was related to the term—including the
Bolognese school of painting—when the Romantic idea emerged at the beginning of
the nineteenth century. The rationality of a systematic combination of styles stood in
contrast to artistic notions that promoted impulsiveness. Romantic writers and crit-
ics also rebelled against a second term that was associated with academic thought—
the juste milieu, a philosophy concerned with compromise, which was inconceivable
from a Romantic point of view that regarded it as a synonym for mediocrity. Baude-
laire’s above-mentioned metaphor of a ship that tries to advance with the help of
four opposing winds thus perfectly illustrates the Romantic rebuff of eclecticism.
67 ‘wenn vielmehr der Eklekticismus die Wahrheit, welche in keinem einzelnen System zu finden sein sollte,
aus allen Systemen zusammenzulesen unternommen hatte, so gehörte nur eine mässige Aufmerksamkeit dazu,
um zu bemerken, dass die Bruchstücke der verschiedenen Systeme sich gar nicht so unmittelbar vereinigen
lassen, dass jeder philosophische Satz seinen bestimmten Systems hat, wogegen Sätze aus verschiedenen
Systemen ebenso, wie diese selbst einander ausschliessen, dass der Widerspruch der entgegengesetzten
Theorieen ihre Auktorität neutralisirt, und dass der Versuch, die übereinstimmenden Sätze der Philosophen
als anerkannte Wahrheit zu Grunde zu legen, an der Thatsache ihrer Nichtübereinstimmung scheitert.’ Zeller,
Philosophie der Griechen, pp. 327–328; Zeller, A History of Eclecticism, pp. 21–22.
The Dismissal of Eclecticism in the Twentieth Century
The derogatory approach that dominated nineteenth-century attitudes toward the

Bolognese painters persisted throughout the first half of the twentieth century. According
to this approach, eclectic theory and practice, as exemplified by the philosopher Victor
Cousin and the painter Paul Delaroche, were academic. The Carracci reform was simi-
larly viewed as an academic endeavour where eclecticism was the result of an attempt to
assimilate or combine too many opposing styles, resulting in a failure to produce good art.
In a guide to the masterpieces of the Louvre, published c. 1905, Florence Heywood
wrote about the Carracci and their eclecticism in a chapter given the derogatory title
‘Art during the Decadence’. According to Heywood:
When painting was in this degenerate condition, there arose in Bologna a group of
artists, the Caracci and their followers, who deliberately and earnestly set to work
to elevate art. They founded the Bolognese Academy, and called themselves the
‘Eclectics,’ for they sought to select and unite the best qualities of the great artists.
A sonnet by Agostino Caracci ably sets forth their principles.68
After citing the sonnet, Heywood concluded:
But they failed to appreciate that the intoxicating voluptuousness and joyous beau-
ty of Correggio, the serenity and harmony of Raphael, and austere, poetic grandeur
of Michel Angelo were the outpourings of individual temperaments, and could not
be combined. In following after others, in formulating principles of theories to be
their guides, the Eclectics observed nature too little and were without inspiration.
Their art was academic and lifeless.
The Romantic ideal of artistic individuality, coupled with a critical view of the juste
milieu, are prominent in Heywood’s description. Although not mentioned explicitly,
Baudelaire’s metaphor of the ship is clearly echoed by this passage.
This same perception of the Carracci and their followers was still very much
alive as late as 1934. In his book on the Baroque painters of Italy, Arthur MacComb
described the Carracci reform of painting in a more scholarly manner, yet he still
regarded its eclecticism as ‘academic in character’:
Every single element in the art of painting seemed to them to have been already
pushed to its logical conclusion and formulated for all time. The endeavor must
now lie in combining with the maximum of skill and knowledge the different mer-
its of the great masters.69
68 Heywood, The Important Pictures of the Louvre, p. 147.
69 MacComb, The Baroque Painters of Italy, p. 10.
Criticism 181
Pointing to Lomazzo’s description of Adam and Eve as one of their sources of inspi-
ration, MacComb mentioned Agostino’s sonnet, yet he doubted its programmatic
qualities, stressing instead its bewildering nature.70 He argued that ‘Their [Carracci]
refined eclecticism simply led to a new style, which we may call the Early Baroque’,
and went on to explain:
In their brownish tones, their fused colour, in their composing at right angles to the
frame instead of horizontally parallel to the frame, in the contrapposto attitudes
of their figures, the Carracci are Baroque. On the other hand, in their sense of the
limitation of the picture-space by the frame, in their use of the nude figure (which
the High Baroque style avoided) they were ‘classic’ and ‘Renaissance’.
The Carracci, according to this quote, embraced three styles, which the author calls
‘Baroque’, ‘classic’, and ‘Renaissance’. In his description of the upper section in Anni-
bale’s Dresden Assunta from 1587, MacComb reinstated the traditional perception of
eclecticism formulated by Malvasia, noting that the painter differentiated between
the figures of the apostles gathered around the Madonna’s tomb and the angels in the
sky. The apostles were painted in the manner of Titian, while the angels were influ-
enced by the style of Correggio. Yet he did not explain the painting’s programmatic
arrangement, nor did he write about the style employed to depict the Madonna, the
composition’s main protagonist.71
The eminent Italian art historian Lionello Venturi, known for his passion for Car-
avaggio, offered his own derogatory account of eclecticism:
There was a very serious danger latent in the procedures of the Carracci: that of
eclecticism. By the close of the XVIth Century, following a bad example set them
by the writers of the day, most artists had taken to eclecticism; that is to say, they
borrowed freely from other painters and their work became a concoction of dif-
ferent, ill-assorted styles, taken over as a rule from Raphael and Correggio, Michel-
angelo and Titian. Obviously this patchwork effect becomes apparent only when
the borrowed elements are not fully integrated into the artist’s own style and thus
their origins are plain to see. The Carracci stand head and shoulders above the
other eclectics, for they achieved a truly personal style—even if occasionally they
betrayed the sources whence they drew their inspiration.72
Venturi seemed to have recognized the non-assimilated type of eclecticism, yet he was
quite critical of it. He also ascribed to the Carracci and their followers an attempt to
follow the theories of art that prevailed at the end of the sixteenth century. Although

72 Venturi, Italian Painting, p. 14.
not mentioned explicitly, it is reasonable to assume that he thought about Lomazzo,

and especially about his description of Adam and Eve. Like Lomazzo, Venturi paired
Raphael with Correggio and Michelangelo with Titian.
When Mahon began his research on seventeenth-century painting, the two main
assumptions concerning painting in Bologna were that the only Bolognese painters worth
mentioning were the Carracci because all other painters were considered to be their fol-
lowers, and that Bolognese art was based on the artistic theory of eclecticism as defined in
Agostino’s sonnet. A second pair of conventional assumptions that dominated art schol-
arship in the first half of the twentieth century were that eclecticism was academic, and
that academic art was bad art—a notion shaped by a Romantic contrast between the
avant-garde or ‘advanced’ artists and the so-called conservative academy.73 This contempt
for academic painting, especially that of the nineteenth century, is exemplified in a 1916
article by Arthur Hoeber, in which he surveyed French painting in the nineteenth century:
The cold, lifeless, academic formulas, deemed necessary in the works of art, were
not inspiring; for a while artists labored according to traditions, producing stilted,
unsympathetic compositions, which to-day, in spite of their dexterity and scholar-
ly seriousness, sometimes provoke smiles at wasted labor. It was considered almost
criminal to paint the present; and heroes of antiquity were dragged from their rest-
ing places to furnish themes.74
In 1932, the French art critic Paul Jamot wrote a series of articles charting the evolu-
tion of French painting, in which he defined the works of François Clouet (1510–1572)
as the last authentic French paintings created before Italianism diverted French art
off its course. Jamot then delineated the emergence of Italianism in the Fontaineb-
leau school of painting and described the seventeenth century as characterized by the
supremacy of academism, which he associated above all with Simon Vouet. He regard-
ed this style as ‘a somewhat unsympathetic transitional art’, adding that ‘the germs
of Academism can be detected in it’.75 Among the Italian painters of the seventeenth
century, the author thought that Caravaggio was the only one deserving of mention,
although he limited his enthusiasm by stating that Caravaggio did not belong to the
first rank of painters. Still, he was the only painter who returned to nature, and thus he
differed greatly from the ‘Academism of the majority of his contemporaries’.76 Indeed,
Jamot traces the deterioration of painting to seventeenth-century Rome:
At that date the artists gathered in Rome, whether Italian or foreign, enrolled
themselves for the most part under the banners of the pompous Academic art
73 Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 158.

74 Hoeber, ‘Painting of the Nineteenth Century in France’, p. 502.
75 Jamot, ‘French Painting-II’, pp. 2–3.
76 Jamot, ‘French Painting-II’, p. 4.
Criticism 183
formulated by the Bolognese or under the rugged standard of naturalism with Car-
avaggio and his disciples.77
In a single sentence, Jamot thus ties together academic art, Bolognese painting, and
a derogatory attitude, adding the adjective ‘pompous’ in reference to the academic
art of the Bolognese painters.
In his 1939 article on avant-garde and kitsch, the influential art critic and essay-
ist Clement Greenberg further underscored the connection between academic art
and bad art, which he saw as similarly imitative in nature, in his famous dictum:
‘Self-evidently, all kitsch is academic; and conversely, all that’s academic is kitsch.’78 A
similar opposition between young, bohemian, subversive painters and the old, stag-
nant, academic approach is evident in a 1948 article by Walter Friedlaender (written
a year after the publication of Mahon’s book), in which he contrasted Caravaggio
with Federico Zuccari. He stressed that one of Zuccari’s main goals in establishing
the academy was to create a new artistic institution that would serve ‘as a bulwark
against vicious modernistic and individualistic novelties’.79 Friedlaender’s attitude is
very different from the explanation provided in 1947 by Mahon, who wrote that Zuc-
cari’s aim was ‘to increase the esteem felt for the arts’ and ‘to give a marked educa-
tional tendency […] in the sense of providing instruction for young beginners in the
rudiments of art’.80 Caravaggio, on the other hand, is perceived by Friedlaender as a
‘young revolutionary intruder’. He later described the two painters as ‘the old acade-
mician against the young genius’,81 and ended his article—which was inspired by the
modern perception of both artistic groups—with the following statement: ‘he [the
artist-academician] subordinates his faculties to its [the community’s] service, but at
the same time he tries to impose his ideals—for the most part reactionary—on this
community, or the world, as a kind of artistic morality.’82
Friedlaender’s article confirms the attitude that prevailed when Mahon wrote his
most important book, in which he opposed the traditional notion of Zuccari as the
‘leader of an “academic” opposition to Caravaggio’.83 These generalizations, Mahon
argued, led to a misunderstanding of seventeenth-century art. Friedlaender, by con-
trast, wrote: ‘The independent artist, on the other hand, divorces himself more than
was earlier thought possible, from the community and convention.’84 According to
Friedlaender, Caravaggio attempted to associate himself with the common people
rather than the bourgeoisie, leading to his comparison to Gustave Courbet.
77 Jamot, ‘French Painting-II’, p. 9.

78 Greenberg, ‘Avant-Garde and Kitsch’, p. 40.
79 Friedlaender, ‘Zuccari and Caravaggio’, p. 30.
As Romantic as he may seem, Friedlaender, one of the greatest modern pioneers

in the study of seventeenth-century Italian art, was exceptional in his approach
toward eclecticism and the Carracci, suggesting as he did a novel artistic awareness
at the beginning of the seventeenth century. He objected to the prevailing view that
connected the art of this period with art theory, acknowledging that early seven-
teenth-century artists were not concerned with theoretical discussions. By doing so,
he implied that eclecticism, as a theory, was not to be associated with the Carracci.
In his Mannerism and Anti-Mannerism in Italian Painting, first published in 1928/9 in
German, he wrote:
What is absent from the thought of all these men [Friedlaender is referring here
to the Carracci, among others] is the theoretical side. They did not theorize near-
ly so much as the maniera people who insofar as they were not merely superior
house painters, arranged and delivered lectures, wrote treatises, concocted theo-
ries of art, and were in general, literary minded. […] After Lomazzo and Zuccaro
(who belonged to an older generation), scribbling on the theory of art stopped
for a while, and so did the academy lectures, which Zuccaro had founded. Only
with the increasing classicism of the second half of the seventeenth century does
art theory begin to come alive again, based this time on a firmer foundation. The
generation of which we are now speaking had too much to do in the way of practi-
cal accomplishments to permit itself the luxury of theorizing. Its strength was not
created from this, and just as little from increased academic activity, except insofar
as the academy encouraged the grasping of reality and the training of the eye on
the model.85
Friedlaender was quite explicit in his rejection of art theory’s influence on artistic
creation at the turn of the seventeenth century, claiming that the period’s reformist
painters were too busy in their reform to actually theorize about it.
Mahon’s encounter with an unfavourable and pejorative view of the Carracci
necessitated a new approach, which would make it possible to re-evaluate their art
without prejudice. The derogatory connotation of eclecticism, which was deeply
rooted in the art-historical literature, was the primary reason for Mahon’s extreme
action of excluding eclecticism from the vocabulary of art history: ‘We must bear in
mind, however, that we shall not completely free ourselves from its deceptive influ-
ence unless we firmly resolve to reform our terminology.’86 Mahon, who appreciated
the artistic values embedded in the art of the Bolognese painters, set out to redeem
85 Friedlaender, Mannerism, p. 53. For its first publication, see Walter Friedlaender, ‘Der antimanieristische
Stil um 1590 und sein Verhaltnis zum Ubersinnlichen’, Vorträge der Bibliothek Warburg (1928/9), pp. 214–243.
See also Posner’s introduction to the publication in English, p. xvi.
Criticism 185
their status by means of a head-on attack on the very concept of eclecticism, as is

evident in the chapter of his book titled ‘The Construction of a Legend’.
The need of the hour demanded an extreme action. Eclecticism was sacrificed in
a brilliant manoeuvre, which succeeded in rehabilitating the Carracci as well as the
other major Bolognese painters of the seventeenth century. Mahon’s approach did
the trick. He managed to separate this concept, with its derisive association and con-
nection to academic art, from Bolognese painting. When one considers, for example,
the simplistic nineteenth-century perception of the Renaissance as a clear-cut rejec-
tion of the Middle Ages and a return to the classical heritage is still ongoing, Mahon’s
success appears all the more exceptional and unique.87
Mahon’s accomplishment, however, was not without its problems. As Dempsey
later suggested, he may have thrown out the baby with the bath water.88 Bolus-Re-
ichert added that ‘to disavow the Carracci’s knowledge of theory in order to recover
their original reputation (based, as we have seen, on the very eclectic method now
considered so discreditable) seems profoundly misleading’.89
Mahon strengthened his rejection of eclecticism by pointing to a process of sty-
listic evolution that contradicts an eclectic approach, which by definition, employs
different styles simultaneously. His discussion of two of the main protagonists of
his book, Guercino and Annibale, who belonged to the so-called group of eclec-
tic painters, suggests an encounter with different styles in a chronological order.
Instead of viewing their use of different stylistic tools as dependent on the subject
that the painters were asked to convey, Mahon described a long process of lin-
ear development from one style to another, thus excluding the possibility of an
eclectic approach. This evolution becomes evident, according to Mahon, when we
compare works that Guercino completed before going to Rome with those execut-
ed after his return to Cento. In the first part of his book, he delineated Guercino’s
stylistic evolution, from his early painterly naturalism to his late classicism and
idealism.
One of Mahon’s examples is a comparison between Guercino’s Elijah Fed by Ravens
of 1620 (Figure 38) and his St. Francis of 1645 (Figure 39). The diagonal composition
and the dynamic movement of the main protagonist in the painting of Elijah, which
87 In his 1972 book The Italian Renaissance: Culture and Society in Italy, Peter Burke writes: ‘The conventional
nineteenth-century view of the arts in Renaissance Italy (a view still widely shared today, despite the labours
of art historians) might be summarized as follows. The art flourished, and their new realism, secularism and
individualism all show that the Middle Ages were over and that the modern world had begun.’ Burke then
continues his criticism by stating: ‘Contemporaries [Renaissance artists] generally claimed to be imitating the
ancients and breaking with the recent past, but in practice they borrowed from both traditions and followed
neither completely. As so often happens, the new was added to the old rather than substituted for it […]
Realism, secularism and individualism are three features commonly attributed to the arts in Renaissance Italy.
All three characteristics are problematic.’ Burke, The Italian Renaissance, p. 15 and p. 19.
89 Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, pp. 31–32.
Figure 38: Guercino, Elijah Fed by Ravens, 1620, The National Gallery, London (Photo: © The National Gallery, London).
is typical of his early compositions, can no longer be seen in the painting of St. Fran-
cis. This later composition is more balanced, and the saint’s body is constructed of
solid forms.90 This dramatic change, Mahon maintained, happened in Rome, where
Guercino’s style underwent a tremendous change, as is evident in his St. Petronil-
la altarpiece.91 He attributed this change to a supposed meeting that took place
between the young provincial painter and Agucchi, who was at the peak of his career
90 Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 12–18.

91 The two styles apparent in the St. Petronilla altarpiece have always been regarded as an indication of
Guercino’s change of style. For the painting’s eclectic construction, see Steinberg who writes: ‘Guercino
specialists of the last fifty years have focused on the stylistic disparity between the two zones: low naturalism
crossed with high classicism, their anomalous co-existence being explained as a double surrender to the
influences Guercino encountered in Rome – Caravaggio’s influence agitating the bottom, Domenichino’s
tranquilizing the top.’ See Steinberg, ‘Guercino’s Saint Petronilla’, p. 211.
Criticism 187
Figure 39: Guercino, St. Francis, 1645, San Giovanni in Monte, Bologna (Photo: © Archivio Fotografico del Polo
Museale dell’Emilia Romagna / Villani).
as Segretario di Stato and a very close advisor to Pope Gregory XV. Guercino, Mahon
claimed, acquired this new style only gradually. His main argument was that during
Guercino’s two-and-a-half-year stay in Rome, between 1621 and 1623, he encountered
Agucchi and his artistic theory, and responded to it by a gradual shift towards a clas-
sical Baroque style. This stylistic development continued until the early 1630s, when
he attained what is known today as his mature classicist style.92
Mahon admits that the stylistic influence of an art theorist on a practicing painter
was rather unusual. Both in the introduction to his book and in additional articles,
he accepted Friedlaender’s earlier observations, maintaining that art theory c. 1600
was ineffective: ‘the theory was above all literary and interpretive rather than artistic
and creative.’93 Nevertheless, he still claims Agucchi’s exceptional stylistic influence
on Guercino. Mahon’s suggestion that Agucchi’s art theory had a significant influ-
ence on Guercino had one fundamental problem: he was unable to offer any viable
proof that Agucchi and Guercino had ever met. There is no documented correspon-
dence between the two, and Guercino received no commissions from this high-rank-
ing, busy official. Agucchi never mentioned Guercino in any of his writings, nor did
Guercino ever mention Agucchi. Relying as his sole evidence on an alleged meeting
between the two, Mahon limited himself to saying that such a meeting was ‘extreme-
ly probable’.94 However, he made assumptions concerning what Agucchi might have
said to Guercino, and referred to Domenichino as a mediator.
Furthermore, the lack of any correspondence between Agucchi and Guercino
must be compared to the documents that do show the extent of Agucchi’s relation-
ship with other painters, such as Domenichino and Ludovico Carracci. Domenichino
had a longstanding and fruitful relationship with Agucchi that lasted for 30 years,
up until Agucchi’s death in 1632. According to Bellori, soon after his arrival in Rome,
Domenichino lived in Agucchi’s house.95
92 Agucchi has received much scholarly attention since 1947 when Mahon published fragments of his
artistic Trattato. Most writers have emphasized his influence on the rise of the classicist style in seventeenth-
century painting, and his contribution to the development of landscape painting in the Italian art of that
time. For fragments of Agucchi’s treatise, see Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 231–275.
93 Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 6. He repeated this perception in an article written in
response to Rensselaer Lee’s review of his book, writing that ‘one of the most striking features of the brief but
distinct moment in art-history with which we are concerned was the absence of general interest in systematic
art-theory of any kind whatsoever’. Mahon, ‘Art Theory and Artistic Practice in the Early Seicento’, p. 227.
This perception was repeated again by Mahon in an article on Caravaggio. ‘First of all it is necessary to make
clear my belief that one of the most striking characteristics of the Italy of about 1600 is that art theory of a
reasoned and articulate kind was, as a general rule, of little consequence to contemporary artists, and indeed
hardly existed as an explicit factor bearing upon the actual creation of paintings.’ Mahon, ‘On Some Aspects
of Caravaggio and His Times’, p. 34.
94 Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, p. 74. Lee found Mahon’s argument regarding the meeting
between the Secretary of State and the painter ‘both ingenious and reasonable’. See Lee, ‘Review’, p. 205.
95 See Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni, p. 309. Richard Spear adds that Domenichino
came to live with the Agucchi brothers sometime between the end of 1603 and the beginning of 1604. See
Spear, Domenichino, I, p. 10. Furthermore, in a letter to Francesco Angeloni, published by Bellori, Domenichino
Criticism 189
One example of Agucchi’s activity as a patron of the arts is his commission from
Ludovico of a painting of Erminia and the Shepherds. One may assume that if Agu-
cchi could have exercised influence of any kind on artists, it would have been on
artists from whom he commissioned works of art. Yet the fact that he did not always
succeed in having painters follow his requests is revealed in a letter of 3 May 1603
written by Agucchi to Bartolomeo Dulcini, in which he confirmed receipt of Ludovi-
co’s painting, which was commissioned in 1602. Ludovico and Agucchi probably met
during the painter’s short visit to Rome.96 Agucchi handed the painter his Impresa per
dipingere l’historia d’Erminia che si racconta nel principio del settimo libro del Godfredo
del Tasso—a detailed account of how he envisaged the scene. Although Agucchi’s
letter conveys his satisfaction with the painting and asks Dulcini to thank the painter
on his behalf, it also contains some reservations regarding the painting’s proportions,
Ludovico’s depiction of the landscape, and missing details. Indeed, when comparing
Agucchi’s specifications with the end product, one can agree that Agucchi was right,
and that Ludovico had not followed his instructions, but rather had ignored most of
Agucchi’s requests.97
As David Stone correctly pointed out, Agucchi never ordered anything from Guer-
cino, and there is no evidence that the two met.98 According to Stone, Guercino was
reacting to the artistic needs and trends prevalent in Cento and Bologna. Guerci-
no’s change of style happened gradually, mainly after his return from Rome. Agucchi
could not have been a relevant source of inspiration, since Guercino was invited to
Rome, thanks to the Ludovisi pope and his nephew, who favoured his early style. It
seems reasonable to assume, however, that whatever change Guercino underwent in
Rome was an outcome of a tendency that Mahon himself attributed to Annibale Car-
racci, writing that ‘Annibale was without doubt profoundly affected by the classical
mentioned Agucchi’s treatise, which he wrote while Domenichino was living in his house. See Bellori, Le vite
de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni, p. 359; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 272; Mahon, Studies
in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 120–121. For the connections between Agucchi and Domenichino, see also
Spear, Domenichino’, I, p. 28 and p. 80.
96 Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, cat. no. 58.
97 For example, Agucchi had wanted the helmet to bear an image of a leopard, the shepherd to be weaving
a basket, and a tear to be visible on Erminia’s face, yet none of these requests were carried out by Ludovico.
On Agucchi’s commission, see Whitfield, ‘A Programme for Erminia and the Shepherd by G. B. Agucchi’, p. 225;
Unger, ‘The Yearning for the Holy Land’, pp. 275–276.
98 In his 1989 doctoral dissertation, David Stone rejected Mahon’s argument. After he re-examined the
stylistic changes that Guercino underwent in the course of his career, he reached the important conclusion
that the influence of the artistic theories of his day on Guercino had been exaggerated. Stone attributes the
notion that Guercino’s patrons exerted an influence on his stylistic decisions to the account of Scannelli’s
encounter with the painter: In response to a question regarding the change of colour towards a bright palette
that marked the works of some successful painters at the time, Guercino supposedly answered that the
change was required in order to satisfy current popular taste. For Guercino’s change of styles around 1630,
see Stone, ‘Theory and Practice in Seicento Art’, p. 21. For the relevancy of Agucchi’s influence in Rome, see
Stone, ‘Theory and Practice in Seicento Art’, pp. 159–160. For Scannelli’s reference in Stone’s dissertation, see
Stone, ‘Theory and Practice in Seicento Art’, pp. 130–131. For Scannelli’s account, see Scannelli, Microcosmo
atmosphere of Rome, which led him to restrain the painterly impulsiveness of his
spirited Bolognese period’.99
A second problem is that there is no stylistic evidence to show that in Rome Guer-
cino and Domenichino shared the same stylistic ideas. There is no doubt that Guer-
cino was very well acquainted with Domenichino’s work. He knew Domenichino’s
Truth Disclosed by Time in the Palazzo Costagutti, where the two collaborated with
Agostino Tassi, and where he himself completed The Abduction of Rinaldo by Armi-
da. Domenichino was the older of the two by some ten years, and one might have
expected him to have exercised some influence on Guercino. However, as Posner has
pointed out, and as far as one can discern from a comparison of their works, there is
no evidence of such influence. Domenichino’s standing as an artist in Rome was not
impeccable. In the years that Guercino spent in the city, Domenichino found himself
vying with Lanfranco for Rome’s artistic hegemony, with Lanfranco eventually gain-
ing the upper hand. According to Posner, Domenichino had tempered his classicism
in order to accord with Lanfranco’s style and fare better in this competition, even
before Guercino arrived in Rome.100 Guercino’s years in Rome were Domenichino’s
worst; although he did win a senior post as court architect in Gregory XV’s adminis-
tration, it was a post that brought more esteem than actual opportunities for work
as a painter.101
Mahon’s discovery of Agucchi’s treatise seems to have motivated his attempt
to form a connection between the theory manifested in this treatise and an active
painter like Guercino, and to suggest an unprecedented theoretical influence over a
practicing artist. Such an extreme method is also discernible in his second unprece-
dented aim in his book—the exclusion of eclecticism from the art historical vocab-
ulary. In this context, Agucchi’s alleged influence on Guercino served to prepare the
ground for Mahon’s bold attempt at dismissing eclecticism. Yet rather than waging
a direct attack on the very notion of eclecticism, Mahon delineated a stylistic pro-
gression seemingly derived from a stylistic theory of art formulated by a cultivated
della pittura, pp. 114–115. See also Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 52–53; Steinberg, ‘Guercino’s
Saint Petronilla’, p. 223; Hutson, Early Modern Art Theory, p. 174.
100 ‘This sudden shift in direction can only be explained as Domenichino’s attempt, in reaction to criticism
of his work, to “modernize” his style in order to meet the challenge of Lanfranco’s art more effectively.’ Posner,
‘Domenichino and Lanfranco’, pp. 139–140.
101 The research on Domenichino contains disagreements concerning his stylistic tendencies during the
years of Guercino’s stay in Rome (1621–1623). Posner is not the only scholar to argue that Domenichino’s style
underwent a far-reaching change during those years, moving close to that of Lanfranco. This change is evident
in his painting in the Church of San Andrea della Valle, with its sweeping motion and perspectives, elements
that were not characteristic of his earlier style. On the change in Domenichino’s style from classicism to the
manner of Lanfranco, see Wittkower, Art and Architecture in Italy 1600–1750, p. 49; Sutherland Harris, Andrea
Sacchi, p. 6; Magnuson, Rome in the Age of Bernini, I, p. 206. Opposition to this approach to Domenichino’s
stylistic evolution is expressed by Spear, Domenichino, I, p. 243. On the rivalry between Domenichino and
Lanfranco, see Cropper, The Domenichino Affair.
Criticism 191
dilettante—Agucchi. By rejecting eclecticism, which he viewed as based on a prob-

lematic sonnet (whose authenticity he doubted),102 Mahon described Guercino as
engaged in an entirely opposite approach: a programmatic, linear development from
an early naturalistic and painterly style to a classicist-idealist one. In doing so, Mahon
managed to make another great contribution to art history—rescuing Guercino from
oblivion.
Next came Mahon’s definition of eclecticism, or of the theory of selection, which
he expressed in a rather simplistic way:
When we investigate the core of the matter we find that the implicit argument
boils down to something in the nature of the following: (1) Artist A’s work shows
the influences of that of Artists B and C (this is on the whole a relatively reasonable
and demonstrable proposition, being a matter of stylistic analysis not primarily
concerned with quality); (2) Artists B and C are good (this is a qualitative judg-
ment, and may or may not be agreed upon); (3) therefore Artist A must be still
better than Artists B and C (needless to say, this does not follow, and we take objec-
tion to the ‘therefore’ and the ‘must’); (4) consequently the general proposition is
arrived at that the more good qualities (this expression is often interchangeable
in actual practice with ‘reminiscences’) of the great men of the past are perceived
(or thought to be perceived) in the work of one man, the better that work can be
argued to be; no further comment is required! The variations of this line of argu-
ment and inference are innumerable and vary from extreme crudity to a measure
of subtlety.103
This limited definition of eclecticism is quite different from the combinations of

styles discernible in Bolognese painting, and especially from the non-assimilated
mixture of styles. It is also different from the definition offered in the eighteenth
century by Brucker, Diderot, and Winckelmann. Nowhere in seventeenth-century
discourse or practice do we find such an attitude. According to Mahon, eclecticism in
the nineteenth century grew to define stylistic variations in accordance with the tra-
ditional perception of the Mannerist orientation.104 This rather distorted understand-
ing of eclecticism led Mahon to conclude that the term was redundant, amounting
to nothing but a label.
One of Mahon’s examples of what he viewed as a typically distorted perception
of the Carracci in the nineteenth century is the account provided by the influential
French art historian Charles Blanc in his book on the Bolognese school of painting.
102 Dempsey was the first scholar in modern times who accepted the authenticity of the sonnet. See
Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, p. 61.
Mahon claimed that his above-mentioned definition of eclecticism rests on Blanc’s

explanation. For Mahon, ‘his [Blanc] remarks would be hard to beat’. According to
Mahon, Blanc disliked the Carracci, whose eclecticism he perceived as a system that
was impossible to implement.105 In fact, however, Blanc remained unclear both in
his description of the Carracci and in his view of eclecticism.106 On the one hand, he
was critical of the assemblage of artistic traits associated with different Old Masters,
as pointed out by Mahon.107 Yet he accepted the ideal perception of beauty, which
is eclectic in terms of its basic characteristics. What is missing in Mahon’s interpre-
tation of Blanc is the latter’s reliance on Bellori in his perception of the Carracci
as paving a middle way between the two extremes represented by Caravaggio and
Cavalier d’Arpino, who emblematized early seventeenth-century naturalism and ide-
alism, respectively.108
Blanc also adhered to an ideal of painting achieved by picking and choosing the
most perfect parts available in nature. This understanding of art, which was simi-
larly inspired by Bellori, was recorded in another publication in which Blanc wrote
about the importance of imitation and of exercising judgment concerning artistic
choices: his Grammaire Historique des arts du dessin, published in 1867, expressed his
belief that a painter needed to learn from nature, imitate it, detect its beauties and
its faults, learn to differentiate between the two and select the elements necessary
for the sake of creating an ideal painting.109 Blanc also elaborated on the Carracci

106 ‘On pouvait les ramener toutes à une seule et les résumer en une phrase: choisir dans chacun des maitres
de premier ordre ce qu’il eu de mieux, étudier le dessin des grands dessinateurs, la couleur des grands
coloristes, les ordonnances de celui-ci, les effets de celui-là, et se composer, de ces qualités diverses, en les
combinant, de plus, avec l’étude de la nature, un style mixte, qui serait excellent puisqu’il n’y manquerait rien,
et que toutes les parties en auraient été puisées aux meilleures sources.’ Blanc, Histoire des peintres de toutes
les écoles, p. xiv.
107 ‘Avons-nous besoin de faire ressortir ce qu’il y aurait d’incohérent et de monstrueux dans un tel amalgame
de qualités absolument contraires? Avons-nous besoin de dire combien il serait absurde de tenter la conciliation
d’éléments aussi inconciliables? Chacun doit comprendre, – et se peut-il que des artistes comme les Carrache
ne l’aient pas compris! – que l’unité dans la conception, dans le sentiment, dans les moyens employés, est la loi
première, la loi essentielle de l’art.’ Blanc, Histoire des peintres de toutes les écoles, pp. xvii–xviii.
108 ‘Au fond, les adversaires des Carrache, le Caravage d’un côté, Josépin de L’autre, feignaient de professer
des systèmes, alors qu’ils ne faisaient qu’obéir à leurs tempéraments.’ Blanc, Histoire des peintres de toutes les
écoles, pp. xiv–xv. See also his final words in his introduction: ‘Semblables à la classe moyenne des sociétés, ils
sont demeurés à égale distance des extrêmes et ils ont ainsi maintenu le peinture aussi loin de son abaissement
que de sa grandeur.’ Blanc, Histoire des peintres de toutes les écoles, p. xix.
109 ‘l’étude le rend capable de découvrir le beautés et les défauts de la nature; il voit dans son modèle des
traits caractéristiques et des parties accessoires; il distingue l’ensemble à travers les détails; il fait dès lors
un choix dans son imitation. Enfin, une contemplation plus profonde lui révéle les lois de la création; il sait
démêler dans les formes de la nature celles qui sont absolument belles, c’est-à-dire conformes aux dessein
de Dieu. Entrevoyant alors une beauté supérieure à la beauté vrai, […] il purifie la réalité des accidents qui la
défiguraient, des alliages qui l’avaient altérée, et il en dégage l’or pur de la beauté primitive; il y retrouve l’idéal.’
Blanc, Grammaire des arts du dessin, p. 9. For Blanc’s ideal perception of painting, see also Ventura, ‘Intention,
Interpretation and Reception’, p. 217.
Criticism 193
academy, and his description of the academy and of its aims may be understood
as positive. What could have been regarded at the turn of the twentieth century as
a critical note in Blanc’s book was his statement that there never was an academy
that was more academic than the Carracci academy.110 However, between the years
1849 and 1869 (before the first Impressionist exhibition in 1874), when the 14 volumes
of his Histoire des peintres de toutes les écoles were published, this statement could
have only been uttered in a respectful way. Clearly, Blanc was not a good example for
Mahon’s promotion of eclecticism as nothing but a label.
In this context, it is interesting to mention the American-born painter James
Abbott McNeill Whistler’s public lecture, delivered at Prince’s Hall, Piccadilly, on 20
February 1885. Whistler advocated for the importance of the ‘pick and choose’ meth-
od by stating the following:
But the artist is born to pick, and choose, and group with science, these elements,
that the result may be beautiful – as the musician gathers his notes, and forms his
chords, until he brings forth from chaos, glorious harmony.111
In his lecture, Whistler addressed nature and the painter’s choice regarding his selec-
tion from what he sees. He continues: ‘To say to the painter, that Nature is to be taken
as she is, is to say to the player, that he may sit on the piano.’
Mahon argued that eclecticism was pejoratively applied to a whole group of art-
ists whose only fault was that they all came from Bologna and lived in the seven-
teenth century. This diverse group of painters, he claimed, was criticized for their
use of an alleged eclectic theory that they had never followed. The term had caused
such damage that it was beyond rehabilitation, so it had to be excluded from the
vocabulary of art history. As he wrote: ‘there is a weighty case for abandoning the use
of the term “eclectic” in connection with the Carracci, if only on the score that its
gross imprecision for practical purposes makes intelligible discussion of their works
confusingly difficult if not impossible.’112 He maintained that by eliminating the term,
modern viewers would be better able to appreciate and evaluate the artistic qualities
not only of the Carracci, but also of the entire Bolognese school of painting. Mahon
was right to a certain extent, as evidenced by the new appreciation of the Carracci
that began to emerge as his rejection of the term gained support, slowly yet consis-
tently evaporating from the scholarship on early modern European art.
110 ‘et jamais institution ne mérita mieux le titre qu’elle avait pris, en ce sens que jamais académie ne fut plus
académique’. Blanc, Histoire des peintres de toutes les écoles, p. xv.
111 Whistler, Ten O’clock, p. 12. The lecture was repeated five more times in different locations in England.
Whistler’s first lecture was printed in a small edition of 25 copies. Three years later, in 1888, it was published
for the first time in England and another edition came out in the same year in Boston and in Paris. The lecture
was translated into French by the poet Stéphane Mallarmé.
112 See Mahon, Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, pp. 195–226. See also Mahon, ‘Eclecticism and the Carracci’,
pp. 303–341; Mahon, ‘Art Theory and Artistic Practice in the Early Seicento’, pp. 228–232.
Mahon cleverly defined eclecticism in a manner that enabled modern scholars to

accept its uselessness. His application of modern terms to the evolution of a seven-
teenth-century painter is evident again in his description of Annibale’s development.
In his ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition’, published in 1957, Mahon described
the course of Annibale’s artistic development in a language that corresponds to
twentieth-century perceptions of modern painters such as Picasso, Mondrian, and
Malevich. Each of them, for instance, ‘went through’ different stylistic phases before
developing a unique style. One noticeable phase that they all underwent was an
Impressionist phase. Mahon viewed Annibale’s initial period of learning in Bologna
as followed by a phase in which Correggio was an important source of inspiration.
Later on, according to this account, Annibale developed a taste for the Venetian style,
with Paolo Veronese as his main source of admiration, followed by his admiration for
classical Roman art, which had a tremendous impact on the development of his late
style.113 One of the paintings that Mahon mentions is the Pietà, which formed part of
the Farnese collection and is today in the Capodimonte Museum in Naples. Mahon
dated the painting to the period preceding the production of the Cerasi altarpiece, in
1599, and described it as follows:
In the opinion of the writer it was about 1599, during the period of the Farnese
vault, that Annibale produced one of his greatest masterpieces, the monumen-
tal, deeply moving and absolutely sincere Pietà from Naples, painted for Cardinal
Farnese. This is the impressive religious counterpart of that baroque modification
of the classical inheritance which can be seen in the Farnese vault: the sort of lan-
guage that Bernini […] was to develop with such mastery.114
Mahon acknowledged classical Roman art as Annibale’s major point of reference,

as evidenced by the two little angelic putti, which were arguably painted following
Annibale’s acquaintance with Raphael’s Sistine Madonna (Dresden, Gemäldegal-
erie).115 Yet what is missing in Mahon’s description of Annibale’s phases is that even in
this relatively late painting, which was completed during the painter’s stay in Rome,
one may discern elements of Annibale’s style that were developed prior to his move
to the Eternal City. For instance, the figures of the Madonna and Christ with their
large, sunken, shadowy eyes, straight noses, and glints of light discernible on their
foreheads and cheeks similarly appear in Ludovico’s St. Francis in Madonna of the
Scalzi (Figure 13), and The Trinity with the Dead Christ (Vatican Museum). Ludovi-
co’s paintings are dated to c. 1590/3.116 The same stylistic elements are also evident in
113 Mahon, ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition’, pp. 274–284.

114 Mahon, ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition’, p. 288.
115 Hall, After Raphael, p. 283.
116 For the dating, see Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, cat. no. 30 and cat. no. 34.
Criticism 195
the figure of St. George in Ludovico’s St. Michael and St. George altarpiece (Plate 1).
Yet Mahon stresses a linear development with distinctive stylistic features typical of
each of his phases, without considering Annibale’s attempt to formulate his different
styles in accordance with the theme he was asked to portray.
Regardless of whether or not one accepts Mahon’s arguments, it would be wrong
to deny his pioneering work and his central role in shaping the modern study of
Baroque art. Significantly, his lead was followed by distinguished scholars who large-
ly accepted his call to exclude eclecticism from the art-historical vocabulary.117 The
conservative response with which Mahon’s book met was aptly expressed by Rens-
selaer W. Lee in his 1951 review of the book. Lee rejected Mahon’s demand to dismiss
the term, reemphasized Annibale’s eclectic method, and came to the conclusion that
Annibale was not as great a painter as Mahon wanted his readers to believe. Lee’s
derogatory perception of eclecticism is underscored at the end of his review: ‘But his
(Annibale’s) eclecticism is also the measure of his artistic inferiority both to the great
predecessors whom he admired and to his great original contemporary, Caravaggio.’118
Lee recognized the impressionistic nature of Mahon’s attempt to explain Guerci-
no’s shift of style from a dark manner to a ‘calm and static and classicizing style’, and
he cited Mahon’s description of Guercino’s change of style: ‘“luminismo,” impression-
istic rather than constructive, is essentially the offspring of the predominant tradi-
tion of North Italy, “loose, colouristic, atmospheric”.’119 Lee also criticized Mahon for
his vague perception of what constituted an academy at the turn of the seventeenth
century.120 Still, he found that Mahon was right in writing that one should not proj-
ect the modern understanding of the ‘academy’ and the ‘advanced’ artist onto the
seventeenth century. At the same time, Lee did think that Zuccari and Bellori should
have been defined as academic, arguing that their classical-ideal view is still valid in
modern art academies.
In this same review, Lee explained that Winckelmann’s positive perception of
the Carracci relied on his firm ideological conviction that the only great art to have
achieved perfection was that of the Greeks.121 For Winckelmann, everything that was
produced in later periods was either bad art or art that strove to imitate the Greeks.
The Carracci painters, like the best Renaissance painters—most notably Raphael
and Michelangelo—came very close to achieving perfection.122 Winckelmann’s des-
ignation of the Carracci as great painters thus relied on two terms—eclecticism and
imitation—which had an impact on the evolution of the first among the two terms
in the nineteenth century.
117 For a summary of the responses to Mahon’s book, see also Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, pp. 1–3.
118 Lee, ‘Review’, pp. 211–212.
119 Lee, ‘Review’, p. 204.
120 Lee, ‘Review’, p. 207.
121 See also Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 23.
122 Lee, ‘Review’, pp. 208–210.
Lee’s objection to Mahon’s dismissal of ‘eclecticism’ underscores the modern per-

ception of Raphael as a genius who was able to assimilate what he had learned from
his predecessors and to produce innovative art, and of Annibale as having remained
concerned with imitating his predecessors’ styles:
Thus Raphael’s mature style is a vital and organic synthesis of elements assimilated
from the art of his own creative age (and, of course, from the antique, which, being
in process of rediscovery, was a very living and present influence as well), while
Annibale’s, for all its novelty, is retrospective. And this difference in their disciple-
ship explains and underscores the difference in artistic quality between the Stanza
della Segnatura and the Farnese Gallery.123
Lee was judging Annibale’s unique style in terms that belong to the times of Vasari.
‘Unity’, he wrote, ‘is the mark of a great genius’. For Lee, Annibale could not have
become a great painter because he was a scholarly painter who adhered to the rules
(of eclecticism).
What Lee did embrace was Mahon’s claim that Guercino’s change of style was
inspired by Agucchi’s art theory, a claim that went hand in hand with his precon-
ceived ideas about the Carracci, their followers, and their academic character and
methods.
Lee, however, was exceptional in his critical response. Most published responses
embraced Mahon’s findings and interpretations. Wittkower expressed his agreement
with Mahon in his explicit condemnation of eclecticism, which appears in his 1952
catalogue of the Carracci drawings in the collection at Windsor Castle:
it was only recently that the bubble of their [the Carracci] ‘eclecticism’ was finally
pricked by Denis Mahon’s exemplary historical analysis. That stigma, which tend-
ed to obscure the vision even of penetrating critics, having been removed, we are
better prepared to look at their work without bias.124
In his famous Art and Architecture 1600–1750 (1958), Wittkower deemed it incon-
ceivable that someone would still consider the term ‘eclecticism’. Mahon, according
to Wittkower, convincingly showed that this concept should not be applied to the
Carracci, noting that although the term itself did not exist in seventeenth-century
artistic discourse, the idea that it expressed received attention in both sixteenth-
and seventeenth-century writings.125 In 1965, he repeated his argument, referring to
Mahon’s conclusion: ‘Mr. Mahon, who has dealt comprehensively with the semantic
123 Lee, ‘Review’, p. 212.

124 Wittkower, The Drawings of the Carracci, p. 9.
125 Wittkower, Art and Architecture in Italy 1600–1750, p. 33; Wittkower, ‘Imitation, Eclecticism, and Genius’,
p. 155.
Criticism 197
confusion to which the term [eclectic] lends itself, suggested to give it a well-earned
rest, and I cannot but support his plea.’126 Wittkower defined the term as ‘a deprecato-
ry label for the theory and practice of selective borrowing’, relating it to the discourse
by Reynolds, which he had discussed earlier in the essay. He rejected the concept of
eclecticism for the same reasons that Mahon had rejected it—that is, for the sake of
art history in general.127
Fifteen years after Mahon published his book, Waterhouse similarly showed his
respect for Mahon’s point of view by stating the following:
Since they sometimes ‘quoted’ motifs or single figures, with brilliant appositeness
and never slavishly, from such earlier masters as Correggio or Veronese, the result-
ing style has long been called ‘eclectic’, which is only unjust if the word is taken (as
it need not be) in a pejorative sense.128
Waterhouse refrained from using the term ‘eclectic’ when describing the Bolognese
painters and their sources of influences. He regarded Ludovico’s finest painting to
be The Madonna of the Scalzi (Figure 13), in which he discerned a High Renaissance
composition and a Mannerist perception of space. He related the depiction of the
Madonna’s head to the influence of Veronese, and that of the baby Jesus and of St.
Jerome to the influence of Correggio. In Annibale’s Madonna with Six Saints, he
detected the influence of Correggio and Titian, as well as the influence of central
Italian painters of the high Renaissance.129 Waterhouse followed Mahon in eliminat-
ing the term ‘eclecticism’ from his vocabulary, and acknowledged both Ludovico and
Annibale in a most positive way.
Like Mahon’s book before him, Posner’s book on Annibale objected to the authen-
ticity of Agostino’s sonnet, and argued that a theoretical concept of systematically
combining stylistic elements was not the aim of the Carracci. Posner saw no differ-
ence between their emulation of different styles and the approach common among
painters throughout history, so he ascribed to it no programmatic intent: ‘It is now
certain that neither Annibale nor his relatives ever concocted or advocated a pro-
gramme for the unification of stylistic excellence, and they were not eclectics in the
nineteenth-century meaning of the term.’130 Objecting to the use of the term eclec-
ticism, he explained that ‘Annibale was preoccupied with a critical investigation of

127 Wittkower, ‘Imitation, Eclecticism, and Genius’, p. 160. See also Ward Bissell’s review of Posner’s book,
where he echoed Mahon’s observation and conclusion: ‘I certainly do not want to re-open the argument over
the use of the term “eclectic’ with reference to Annibale; it ought to be dropped, not because it fails to suggest
something of what Annibale was up to, but because it has taken on irreversibly negative connotations.’ Bissell,
‘Annibale Carracci: A Study in the Reform of Italian Painting around 1590 by Donald Posner’, p. 131.
130 Posner, Annibale Carracci, I, pp. 90–91.
various styles, and that he even deliberately tried out a fusion of Lombard and Roman
style elements’. Posner mentioned Raphael as a painter who similarly fused stylistic
elements from several masters in his work, and ascribed the same practice to Tin-
toretto, Sebastiano del Piombo, and Rubens. With regard to eclecticism, he related
the use of the concept to Winckelmann’s misunderstanding of the early biographers.
Posner explicitly mentions Mancini and Agucchi, explaining that:
Toward 1620, in his Considerazioni sulla pittura, Giulio Mancini characterized the
art of the Carracci as union of ‘the manner of Raphael with that of Lombardy’.
Earlier, around 1610, Giovanni Battista Agucchi had already written that this unifi-
cation of stylistic excellences was a self-appointed task that Annibale and Agostino
conceived immediately upon arriving in Rome.131
The opening words of Charles Dempsey’s 1977 book on Annibale similarly praised
Mahon’s achievements:
Denis Mahon’s Studies in Seicento Art and Theory was one of those rare books
which transformed the understanding and appreciation of its subjects, underpin-
ning a passionate and at times even polemical argument with broad and meticu-
lous scholarship.132
Dempsey continues by pointing to the most problematic aspect of Mahon’s theoreti-

cal claim concerning the relationship between painters and art theorists:
For all that he did to remove prejudice which truly blinded, forcing the viewing
of Bolognese painting with fresh eyes, Mahon carried a prejudice of his own, the
conviction that Seicento theory belonged more to the world of the contemporary
critic, of the likes of Agucchi and Bellori, than it did to the world of practice, the
actual painting of a picture by a living, breathing artist.
Dempsey did not agree with Mahon’s dismissal of the Carracci’s interest in art theory,
yet he did accept Mahon’s call to dismiss eclecticism from the art-historical vocab-
ulary, thus lifting the veil that had blinded viewers and distorted their perception
and judgment. Referring to Mahon’s rejection of eclecticism, he concluded that ‘No
one would argue now with these propositions’. Dempsey then took this conclusion
one step further, arguing that the dismissal of eclecticism should be promoted, not
simply due to its negative connotations, but because it was a misleading and inac-
curate term that did not even begin to describe the revolutionary method used by
131 Posner, Annibale Carracci, I, p. 90.

Criticism 199
the Carracci, and especially not by Annibale. As already noted in the introduction,
Dempsey argued that the term that should have been used instead of ‘eclecticism’
was ‘selective imitation’. This term, one should add, seems to have been inspired by
Antoine-Chrysostome Quatremère de Quincy’s modèle intérieur, with its early nine-
teenth-century emphasis on the creative process conducted in the painter’s mind for
the sake of composing an ideal painting—an imitational process that relies on the
observation of nature, the adaptation of what one sees, and the creation of a perfect
synthesis.133
Dempsey defined eclecticism as a situation in which ‘different artists in different
ways had already expressed different perfections in nature, and sought to create an
art yet more perfect by combining them’.134 Describing the unique approach of the
Carracci, he wrote:
from the point of view of the Carracci, in order to understand the perfections of
the great masters one must also understand nature, imitating nature with their
guidance, but not imitating them—which is the truly eclectic position of the man-
nerist generation, enslaved by practice, before the Carracci.135
133 Quatremère de Quincy wrote: ‘Il est donc vrai de dire avec Cicéron … que l’artiste indépendamment de
tous les moyens d’imitation qui sont comme ses instruments matériels, (et de ce nombre est le modéle qu’il
a sous les yeux) doit avoir encore un modéle intérieur pour diriger son art et sa main, qui artem manumque
dirigat, et vers lequel tendent les yeux de son esprit, quem intuens in eaque defixus, pour realiser cette
perfection idéale qui est le but de l’imitation.’ (‘It is then consistent with truth to say with Cicero, that the
artist, besides all those means which are as it were the material instruments of imitation [and among these is
the model before his eyes], ought to have an internal model by which to direct his art and his hand, qui artem
manumque dirigat, and to which his mind’s eye turns, quem intuens in eaque defixus, in order to realize that
ideal perfection which is the end of imitation.’) Quatremère de Quincy, Essai sur la nature, p. 316. See also
pp. 250–251. For the English translation, see Quatremère de Quincy, An Essay on the Nature, p. 351. See also
Morgan, ‘Concepts of Abstraction’, p. 677.
135 Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 55–56. Dempsey built on Lomazzo’s
ideal perception of a good painting, with his combination of two figures that are made according to two
different styles. For Dempsey, Lomazzo is advancing an idea that ‘art can be created only out of art’, and he
interpreted Lomazzo as indicating that he was advancing a concept, ‘that art itself was higher manifestation
of nature’. This idea seems to overlook the fact that Lomazzo’s concept grew in an artistic environment that
preached for art to be complicated and witty. In his seminal book on Mannerism, John Shearman focused on
the complexity, multiplicity, obscurity, and abundance that characterize sixteenth-century art, quoting Paolo
Pino’s advice to painters in 1548 to ‘include at least one figure that is all distorted, mysterious and difficult’
(‘almeno una figura tutta sforciata, misteriosa, & difficile’). Pino, Dialogo di pittura, p. 16; Pardo, ‘Paolo Pino’s
“‘Dialogo di Pittura”’, p. 335. In his Paragons and Paragone, Rudolf Preimesberger used Pino’s reference in his
discussion of Caravaggio’s Entombment and its witty connections to Michelangelo’s early Pietà. He argued
that Nicodemus’ hunchback in Caravaggio’s painting refers to Vasari’s anecdote, in which Michelangelo
added his signature to his early Pietà after he heard someone attributing it to the ‘little hunchback from
Parinaʼ. Preimesberger also pointed out that Nicodemus’ head resembles known portraits of Michelangelo.
According to Preimesberger, this figure is a manifestation of Caravaggio’s response to Pino’s call for distorted
and ambiguous figures. Caravaggio plays with the figure of Nicodemus as representing both Michelangelo
and himself. Paleotti, in his 1582 book, reacted to this approach by attempting to steer the artistic perception
The Carracci, he continued, were able to learn from the perfections of their prede-
cessors and use them to better understand nature. Each of them, especially Annibale
with his scientific naturalism and Ludovico with his emotional mysticism, managed
to create his own style. Dempsey, it seems, attributed to the Carracci a stylistic meth-
od similar to the one attributed by Vasari to Raphael—the creation of a unique and
original style that assimilated important elements of preceding styles, such as those
of Barocci, Correggio, and Veronese.136 This method is also evident in his discussion
of Ludovico, who according to Dempsey, ‘conceived reform as uniting the qualities of
particular artists, and in particular Emilian and Lombard artists’.137
Dempsey argued for a two-stage process, in which theory leads to practice, claim-
ing that artists developed their own artistic beliefs without explicit reference to a
particular artistic theory.138 He attributed no influence at all to the writings of art
theorists, arguing instead that art theory was implicitly embodied in artistic prac-
tices, such as those conducted at the Carracci Academy. Dempsey’s conceptual
explanation of the combination of practice and theory at the Carracci’s Accademia
degli’ Incamminati, and his special emphasis on the concept of giudizio as the true
intellectual role of the painter in bridging these two realms,139 contrasts sharply with
Mahon’s description of the influence of an art theorist (Agucchi) on a practicing art-
ist (Guercino).140
Dempsey summarized his view in his 1980 article on late sixteenth-century educa-
tion in Bologna, stating that,
Mahon had done well to expunge the Idealist concept of eclecticism from our critical
vocabulary, but he did less well […] when he failed to distinguish eclecticism suffi-
ciently from the very familiar, and very important, Renaissance concept of imitation.141
In his 1984 monograph on Guido Reni, Stephen Pepper, spoke of the ‘myth’ of
eclecticism:
One can think of the 1580s as a decade in which they strove to fill this gap, in which
they were true incamminati, travelling in the sense of searching for knowledge,
of religious painting in the direction of clarity and simplicity. Lomazzo published his book a few years later,
and must have been aware of both Pino’s call and Paleotti’s response. His artistic choices should be addressed
in relation to Paleotti’s ideas—that is, as a call for using more than a single style in a given work of art. See
Shearman, Mannerism, p. 138; Preimesberger, Paragons and Paragone, p. 84 and pp. 101–106.
136 Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 68–69.
138 For a discussion of Dempsey’s conception, see Stone, ‘Theory and Practice in Seicento Art’, pp. 75–91.
139 Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, pp. 56–58. For a similar approach, see
Perini, Gli scritti dei Carracci, pp. 45–46. On the meaning of Giudizio, see Panofsky, Idea, pp. 63–68; Summers,
Michelangelo and the Language of Art, pp. 332–336.
140 On the history of the interaction between theory and practice, see Cropper, Ideal of Painting, pp. 147–148.
141 Dempsey, ‘Some observations on the Education of Artists’, p. 566.
Criticism 201
together with their students, in a joint undertaking to enrich their own artistic her-
itage. One can think of Agostino’s engravings after older artists as a sort of graphics
museum made available for him and for others to study. In this sense, therefore, the
Carracci undertook a thorough investigation of the achievements of the past, as
Dempsey has pointed out. But in no way does this confirm the ‘myth’ of eclecticism
which was used from eighteenth century until recently in a pejorative sense to tar-
nish their reputation and which has at last been demolished by Denis Mahon.142
To this claim, Pepper added in his review of Dempsey’s book, which was published
that same year: ‘Annibale was instrumental in creating a method of instruction for
the young which avoided eclecticism while drawing on the strengths of the masters
of the past.’143
It should be noted that while accepting Mahon’s call to exclude eclecticism from
the art-historical vocabulary, Posner and Dempsey expressed an utterly different
understanding of Annibale’s work. Both regarded eclecticism as a problematic con-
cept that should be avoided, and both, as noted by Goldstein, relied on the same
evidence to formulate different approaches, interpreting the same material from
different points of view.144 In his seminal book on Annibale Carracci, Posner picked
up where Walter Friedlaender had left off. Posner was very explicit about the type
of painter that he imagined Annibale to be, describing him as a professional artist
deeply engaged in his work, with little interest in how it could be translated into a
theoretical stance. According to Posner, Annibale,
had not the intellectual or spiritual resources that enabled artists like Michelan-
gelo, Poussin, and Caravaggio to respond directly and profoundly to general cul-
tural trends of their time. One has the impression, in fact, that Annibale’s life and
thought were dominated by relatively narrow professional concerns. He seems to
have been motivated mainly by a quite uncomplicated desire for success and by a
passionate, but almost craftsman-like, urge to perfect his art.145
For Posner, Annibale followed no theory or programmatic set of rules. Dempsey,

meanwhile, regarded Annibale as an intellectual versed in the artistic literature of
his day. One should not forget that by the time the Carracci embarked on their artis-
tic careers, the artistic discourse was inundated by theoretical treatises that advo-
cated a well-defined reform in painting. Dempsey acknowledged that Annibale was
142 Pepper, Guido Reni, p. 17.

143 Pepper, ‘Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style by Charles Dempsey’, p. 531.
144 Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, p. 4.
145 Posner, Annibale Carracci, I, p. ix. In fact, Posner’s attitude is what sparked Dempsey’s fierce reaction to
Posner’s book. According to Dempsey’s own admission, his book on Annibale began as a review of Posner’s
book. Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, p. 3.
responsive to theoretical perceptions and was affected by the critical judgment of

those who appreciated painting and were well versed in artistic matters, even if they
were not painters themselves.146 The most persuasive fact, in this context, is probably
Annibale’s participation in writing notes to Vasari’s Lives.147 In other words, Dempsey
viewed the Carracci as having consciously expressed their own ideas about art in
their paintings rather than by means of a verbally articulated theory. A verbally con-
ceptualized theory, according to Dempsey, is external to a painter’s mode of repre-
sentation; thus, if we wish to trace a painter’s development as well as his theoretical
preconceptions, we must examine his paintings. In this respect, as Annibale had
reportedly said to his brother (according to early modern sources), a painter talks
with his hands.
When we consider the artistic climate during the first half of the twentieth cen-
tury when Mahon embarked on his career as an art historian, one can understand
the reasons for his rejection of the term ‘eclecticism’. Yet while Mahon’s call to reject
eclecticism as pertaining to early modern Bolognese painting was accepted with
little resistance, he based his understanding of eclecticism on his interpretation of
the views expressed by nineteenth-century thinkers such as Blanc. He ignored the
rich discussion concerning the use of more than a single style in a given painting
as evident in both the theory and practice of early modern painting, as discussed in
Chapter One.
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Conclusion
The Eclectic Approach
As this book has argued, the term ‘eclecticism’ has important implications for the
understanding of seventeenth-century painting and of the Bolognese reform of
painting. The idea represented by this term was articulated in the seventeenth cen-
tury, and is discernible in artistic treatises written during this period. In the work of
Bolognese painters such as Ludovico, Annibale, Reni, and Guercino, one can recog-
nize a type of eclecticism that was ideologically supported by the religious doctrine
of Paleotti, and was acknowledged by Malvasia. What characterized Bolognese eclec-
ticism was the use of more than a single style in a given work of art. This form of
non-assimilated eclecticism was developed by the Bolognese painters in an attempt
to resolve Paleotti’s ideological distinction between representations of the celestial
and the terrestrial realms, between vice and virtue, and between visually familiar and
unfamiliar saints. These Bolognese painters understood the iconographic possibili-
ties made available by this method. Over the course of his artistic career, each of the
painters discussed in this book developed multiple styles that were uniquely his own,
regardless of his inclination toward classicism or naturalism, a linear style or a paint-
erly one. Especially notable in the work of Ludovico, this type of eclecticism should
be regarded as an important contribution of the Bolognese school of painting.
This perception of eclecticism as a practical methodological tool or iconographi-
cal device, and the detection of different styles in a single painting or set of decora-
tions, may direct us to additional layers of meaning in the art of the early seventeenth
century. This is evident in the paintings discussed in Chapter Three, as well as in the
work of other Bolognese painters who are not included in the present study. As the
previous chapters have demonstrated, the type of non-assimilated eclecticism that is
discernible in these paintings was deliberate and was meant to accentuate the mean-
ing of each scene.
This understanding of eclecticism, however, did not persist over time. In the
course of the nineteenth century, the term coined by Winckelmann in 1763 came
to represent a mechanical process of imitating the works of numerous painters in a
single composition, and thus as mediocre art. The term also came to be associated
with stylistic compromise, in accordance with the more general nineteenth-century
ideal of eclecticism as compromise, which was advocated by the French philosopher
Victor Cousin as the juste milieu. These later associations distorted the term’s stylistic
doi: 10.5117/9789462986015/conc
importance as a conscious choice to retain the unique characteristics of each dis-

tinct style, interpreting it instead as a stylistic compromise among the approaches
of various great masters. Eclecticism thus came to be promoted by the French acad-
emy, and was accepted as an academic form of expression. Seen through the prism
of nineteenth-century Romanticism and its idealization of the Bohemian painter,
the term ‘eclecticism’ also came to be negatively associated with academic art. This
association continued to impact twentieth-century scholars such as Denis Mahon,
who sought to rehabilitate the status of the Bolognese painters by calling for the
elimination of the term in art-historical discourse due to its derogative connotations.
My attempt to rehabilitate eclecticism has sought to foreground ideas and lay-
ers of meaning that were lost once the term was excluded from the art-historical
discourse on the Carracci and their followers. This study has aimed to reconsider,
reconceptualize, and redefine the term, which has had an important role in fram-
ing modern scholarship’s understanding of the artistic trends dominant in Bologna
during the period in question. The use of more than one style in a single work of
art provided painters with new ways of conveying meaning that resonated with the
ideas put forth by the Tridentine Reformation and advocated by religious leaders
such as Gabriele Paleotti.
Epilogue
Eclecticism in a Roman Chapel
Abstract
The Epilogue will address an example of non-assimilated eclecticism in a Roman
chapel, where a conscious attempt was made to integrate the works of two paint-
ers—Annibale Carracci and Caravaggio—into a single set of decorations in the Cerasi
Chapel. As this chapter will show, the combination of Annibale’s and Caravaggio’s
different styles served to elucidate the narrative and meaning of the entire chapel.
Keywords: Cerasi, Caravaggio, St. Peter, St. Paul, Annibale Carracci
Paleotti’s attempt to lay down the rules for the creation of religious art did not stop
in Bologna. According to Prodi, Paleotti continued to advocate a reform in religious
painting even after he moved to Rome, up until his death in 1597. Three years earlier,
in 1594, his book Discorso intorno alle imagini sacre et profane diviso in cinque Libri
was published in Latin as De imaginibus sacris et prophanis libri quinque, making it
accessible to readers outside Italy.1 In 1596, he became the protector (in charge of
the visual reform) of the Accademia di San Luca in Rome, together with Cardinal
Francesco Maria del Monte, the well-known patron of Caravaggio.2 In the summer of
the same year, he delivered to Pope Clement VIII a memorandum, titled De tollendis
imaginum abusibus novissima consideration (A fresh consideration of how to remove
the abuses of images), in which he demanded much stricter supervision of religious
paintings and suggested the compilation of an index of prohibited images.3 Yet it
seems that although the ideas reflected in his treatise were appreciated, they did not
create the desired effect of anchoring religious art in a restricted set of laws.4
1 For the Latin text, see Noyes, ‘Aut numquid’, pp. 246–247.
2 Missirini, Memorie per servire alla storia della romana academia di S. Luca, p. 69; Salerno, ‘The Roman
World of Caravaggio’, p. 17; Gianfreda, Caravaggio, Guercino, Mattia Preti, p. 49; Rocco, The Devout Hand, p. 58.
3 Prodi, Il Cardinale Gabriele Paleotti (1522–1597), II, pp. 550–553; Prodi, Ricerche sulla teorica delle arti
figurative nella Riforma Cattolica, pp. 79–81; Jedin, ‘Das Tridentinum und die Bildenden Künste’, pp. 336–339;
Prodi, ‘Introduction’, pp. 24–26; Noyes, ‘Aut numquid’, pp. 249–251; Muraoka, The Path of Humility, p. 125.
See also Paleotti’s reference concerning the need for an index of forbidden images. Paleotti, Discorso, p. 75;
4 See especially Noyes’ article, where she explains Paleotti’s failure. Noyes, ‘Aut numquid’, pp. 239–256.
doi: 10.5117/9789462986015/epi
The extent to which Paleotti’s ideas were received in early seventeenth-century

Rome remains unclear.5 It is safe to speculate that in the case of the religious artworks
commissioned for public spaces like churches, the patrons did not pursue Paleotti’s
doctrine. One example in which an eclectic approach is evident in Rome may be
found in Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani’s palace. Giustiniani’s stylistic approach
can be gleaned from his famous letter to the Flemish poet Teodoro Amayden, who
lived in Rome, which was written c. 1620. In this letter, Giustiniani expressed his
thoughts on art and elaborated on the different methods of painting, dividing them
into twelve categories. In his twelfth stylistic category, Guistiniani made a distinc-
tion between the tenth method, in which a painter is instigated by his imagination,
and the eleventh method, in which a painter is inspired directly from nature. He
argued that the greatest challenge was to create a painting that combined these two
approaches, which he identified as di maniera and naturale. Although some paint-
ers, he wrote, accentuate one style over the other, such a combination was the most
perfect form of art. This twelfth method, he added, was characteristic of Caravaggio,
Annibale Carracci, and Reni.6
Especially pertinent for the current discussion is the use of different styles that
Giustiniani identified in the works of Caravaggio, Annibale, and Reni. According to
Bellori, Caravaggio’s rejected St. Matthew and the Angel was bought by Giustiniani
and placed in his residence alongside paintings of the other evangelists by Reni,
Domenichino, and Albani.7 The joint display of paintings portraying the four evange-
lists was common during the early modern period. Giustiniani, however, was unique
in his stylistic disposition.
5 One example, at Santa Trinità dei Pellegrini, is an altarpiece of the Madonna and Child Appearing to Sts.
Carlo Borromeo, Filippo Neri, Domenico and Felice. Completed in 1677 by the French painter Guillaume Courtois,
this set of decorations follows the same format as observed in the Cerasi chapel, with the protagonists of the
lateral paintings repeated in the main altar.
6 ‘Duodecimo modo, è il più perfetto di tutti; perchè è più difficile, l’unire il modo decimo con l’undecimo
già detti, cioè dipingnere di maniera, e con l’esempio avanti del naturale, che così dipinsero gli eccellenti
pittori della prima classe, noti al mondo; ed ai nostri dì il Caravaggio, i Caracci, e Guido Reni, ed altri, tra i
quali taluno ha premuto più nel naturale che nella maniera, e taluno più nella maniera che nel naturale,
senza però discostarsi dall’uno, nè dall’altro modo di dipingnere, premendo nel buon disegno, e vero colorito,
e con dare i lumi propri e veri.’ Bottari and Ticozzi, Raccolta di lettere sulla pittura, VI, p. 127. ‘The twelfth
method is the most perfect of all since it is the rarest and most difficult. It is the union of the tenth with
the eleventh method, that is to say, to paint di maniera and also directly from life. In our time, this is the
way that Caravaggio, the Carracci, Guido Reni, and other world-famous painters of the highest rank painted.
Some of them were inclined more toward nature than the maniera and some more toward the maniera than
toward nature, without however abandoning either method, and emphasizing good design, true colors, and
appropriate realistic lighting.’ See Enggass and Brown, Italy and Spain 1600–1750, p. 19. On Giustiniani and his
admiration of the two artists, see Breazeale, ‘Un gran soggetto ma non ideale’, p. 3. See also Muraoka, The Path
of Humility, pp. 158–159; Boschloo, The Limits of Artistic Freedom, p. 137. For the term maniera as the basis of
the modern concept of Mannerism, see Shearman, Mannerism, p. 174.
7 Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti moderni, p. 206; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 181.
Figure 40: Annibale Carracci, Assumption of the Virgin, 1600/1, Cappella Cerasi, Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome
(Photo: © José Luiz Bernardes Ribeiro / via Wikimedia Commons).
It is difficult to determine whether the eclectic ensemble created by Giustiniani’s

placement of St. Matthew and the Angel alongside the other evangelists painted by
Reni, Domenichino, and Albani was solely an expression of his personal sensibility or
whether it expressed a broader convention of combining stylistically diverse paint-

ings to create an eclectic effect. Yet even though Bellori’s mention of this ensemble
cannot be regarded as an indication that Paleotti’s ideas were received in Rome, it
reveals that at least in one instance, an intentional combination of styles was put on
display in the home of an important Roman collector. In the following discussion, I
would like to turn to another example of an eclectic ensemble of paintings—in this
case an entire set of decorations that was commissioned from two different artists,
thus further highlighting the role of the patron, rather than of an individual artist, in
implementing an eclectic program. The importance of this commission, which simi-
larly involved Giustiniani, is due to its placement in the public sphere.
I have chosen to discuss the example of the Cerasi Chapel in an epilogue because
it addresses the decoration of a chapel in Rome, in contrast to the artworks dis-
cussed throughout this book, which were intended for Bolognese eyes. Moreover,
this discussion attends to an eclectic combination of styles in a set of decorations
created by more than one painter in an attempt to deliver a unified message. This
short discussion thus exemplifies the further development of eclectic thinking or
an eclectic disposition. It might be seen as an example of the Bolognese influence
in Rome, or else as an independent development whose understanding requires
further research.
In the jubilee year of 1600, Monsignor Tiberio Cerasi, Pope Clement VIII’s treasur-
er, commissioned three paintings from two of the most prominent young painters in
Rome for his newly purchased chapel in Santa Maria del Popolo. Annibale Carracci
was commissioned to depict the Assumption of the Virgin (Figure 40), and Caravaggio
was commissioned to paint two themes: the Crucifixion of St. Peter (Figure 41) and
the Conversion of St. Paul (Figure 42). Annibale’s painting was to be situated above
the altar, while Caravaggio’s paintings were to be situated on the chapel’s eastern and
western walls, flanking Annibale’s altarpiece. For want of documentation, we do not
know the exact date on which Annibale completed his Assumption of the Virgin. We
do know, however, that Caravaggio completed the first versions by 10 November 1601,
more than six months after his patron’s death. On this day he received the final pay-
ment, which, according to the signed contract between him and Monsignor Cerasi,
amounted to 400 scudi.8
In addition to the altarpiece, Annibale, according to Bellori, was responsible for
the decoration of the ceiling. Both Giovanni Baglione and Bellori claimed that it was
Annibale’s pupil, Innocenzio Tacconi, who painted the frescoes, with Bellori adding
8 According to the contract, Caravaggio committed himself to finishing the two paintings within eight
months; the works were to be painted on cypress wood, and he was to be paid a total of 400 scudi. See
Mahon, ‘Egregius in Urbe Pictor’, pp. 226–227; Hinks, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, p. 108; Friedlaender,
Caravaggio Studies, p. 302; Puglisi, Caravaggio, p. 146; Pepper, ‘Caravaggio, Carracci, and the Cerasi Chapel’, p.
109; Spezzaferro, ‘La Cappella Cerasi e il Caravaggio’, p. 10.
Figure 41: Caravaggio, Crucifixion of St. Peter, 1604, Cappella Cerasi, Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome (Photo: After
Sybille Ebert-Shifferer, Caravaggio: The Artist and His Work, Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012).
that Annibale only retouched them.9 Stephen Pepper has suggested that Annibale
managed to complete the main scene among the three painted on the ceiling, the
Coronation of the Virgin. The other two scenes, which were taken from the lives of
Peter and Paul—Domine Quo Vadis and St. Paul in Ecstasy—were executed entirely
by Tacconi.10
It remains unclear why Annibale did not complete the frescoes himself, nor is
it clear why he was not asked to execute the two side panels, in which Caravaggio
depicted scenes from the lives of Peter and Paul.11 Pepper speculated that he was too
9 Baglione, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti, I, p. 107 and p. 312; Bellori, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et
architetti moderni, p. 83; Bellori, The Lives of the Modern Painters, p. 100. See also Steinberg, ‘Observation in the
Cerasi Chapel’, p. 184; Schleier, ‘Innocenzo Tacconi 1603’, p. 666.
10 Pepper, ‘Caravaggio, Carracci, and the Cerasi Chapel’, p. 112.
11 Indeed, Beverly Louise Brown suggested that Annibale might have been commissioned to decorate the
entire chapel and that for some reason the patron changed his mind. For this suggestion, see Brown, ‘The
Black Wings of Envy’, p. 252.
Figure 42: Caravaggio, Conversion of St. Paul, 1604, Cappella Cerasi, Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome (Photo: After
Sybille Ebert-Shifferer, Caravaggio: The Artist and His Work, Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012).
busy with the decoration of the Farnese Gallery.12 This explanation, however, seems
to overlook the utterly different stylistic approaches of Annibale and Caravaggio.
If Annibale’s unavailability was indeed the reason, and even if Tacconi had to be
replaced due to his incompetence as a painter (as suggested by Pepper), painters
with a closer affinity to Annibale’s style could have been asked to do the work. The
choice of Caravaggio must have had different motives.
Although modern scholarship has devoted much attention to the Cerasi Chapel,
most of the writers have focused on the individual developments implemented by
one of the two artists.13 With regard to the combination of the three works, art histo-
rians have tended to explain this commission as an attempt to engage the two artists
in a stylistic competition of sorts, even though such a competition would have been

13 This has been claimed by Creighton E. Gilbert. See Gilbert, Caravaggio and His Two Cardinals, p. 81.
more typical of the High Renaissance.14 Moreover, this explanation seems to overlook
the religious dimension of the commission, which was made during the era of the
Catholic Reformation. One should also bear in mind that the paintings were com-
missioned for a burial chapel, and that the commissioner was a high-ranking official
in the papal court.15
What I would like to argue is that the entire conception of the Cerasi Chapel was
based on a preconceived and deliberate stylistic choice to juxtapose the works of
these two artists. Modern scholars have argued that the recommendation to com-
mission Annibale and Caravaggio came from Vincenzo Giustiniani, himself an avid
collector of both artists’ works.16 If these scholars are right, this choice requires
careful attention as a further indication of Guistiniani’s eclectic approach. In this
regard, one should take notice of the findings of Luigi Spezzaferro, and especially
of the codicil of the Cerasi will, which states that the famous architect Carlo Mad-
erno was in charge of the entire programme of the chapel, including the design of
the architecture, tombs, and decorative scheme. Spezzaferro saw this document
as proof that Maderno was also responsible for commissioning the works of Anni-
bale and Caravaggio.17 The hypothesis that the entire decoration of the chapel was
related to a single programme further suggests that the decision to commission
both Caravaggio and Annibale stemmed from an eclectic approach. Regardless of
whether the decision to modify the two lateral paintings was made by the patron,
by Giustiniani, by Maderno, or by Caravaggio himself (as suggested by Spezzafer-
ro),18 it is clear that the combination of paintings by artists working in two differ-
ent styles was an intentional one, and that it was done for the sake of delivering a
unified message.
In what follows, I will show that the styles of the two most prominent young paint-
ers in early seventeenth-century Rome were combined in order to emphasize the
religious dimension of the entire set of decorations, rather than in order to set up
a competition between them. As this discussion will reveal, the Cerasi commission
14 One early nineteenth-century reference that follows the traditional understanding regarding the
competition between Annibale and Caravaggio is the following one by Buchanan: ‘The greatest competitor
whom the Caracci themselves had to contend against at the formation of their new style, was Caravaggio.’
Buchanan, Memoirs of Painting, p. 92. See also Gilbert, Caravaggio and His Two Cardinals, pp. 81–97; Langdon,
Caravaggio, p. 180; Brown, ‘The Black Wings of Envy’, p. 252; Sciberras and Stone, Caravaggio, p. 9. For the
subject of competition among painters in the sixteenth century, see Goffen, Renaissance Rivals, especially pp.
143–155.
15 Monsignor Tiberio Cerasi was the treasurer general under Pope Clement VIII, a position he acquired for a
huge sum of money (30,000 scudi). Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, vol. 23 (1979), See Hibbard, Caravaggio,
p. 119.
16 Mahon, ‘Egregius in Urbe Pictor’, p. 227; Hibbard, Caravaggio, p. 119; Gilbert, Caravaggio and His Two
Cardinals, p. 106.
17 Spezzaferro, ‘La Cappella Cerasi e il Caravaggio’, pp. 10–14.
18 Spezzaferro, ‘La Cappella Cerasi e il Caravaggio’, p. 15.
can be read as an attempt to follow Paleotti’s doctrine and ensure the public’s under-
standing of the religious messages incorporated into the chapel.
Annibale Carracci and Caravaggio attracted much attention in Roman artistic
circles at the turn of the seventeenth century, making their mark as the leaders of
two new stylistic trends. Annibale gained a solid reputation thanks to his achieve-
ments in the decoration of the Farnese Palace (1597–1601). At the time of the Cerasi
commission, he was still occupied with the ceiling decoration of the Farnese Gallery.
Roman spectators had not seen such a novel approach to painting since Michelan-
gelo’s reform of the art of painting in his ceiling decorations for the Sistine Chapel.
Caravaggio’s success, meanwhile, drew the attention of the most renowned artist of
the day, Federico Zuccari, the founder and first president of the Accademia di San
Luca in Rome. According to Baglione, upon visiting the Contarelli Chapel, Zuccari
proclaimed it to be ‘il pensiero di Giorgione’.19 This association to the style of the
Venetian painter Giorgione reflects not only his quite understandable dissatisfaction
with Caravaggio’s style, but also his discomfort with how his own artistic methods
were being successfully challenged by a painter of the younger generation. Never-
theless, Zuccari’s reaction did not prevent Caravaggio from winning the support and
admiration of such great patrons as Cardinal Del Monte, Cardinal Borghese, Cardinal
Mattei, and the Giustiniani brothers.
Annibale Carracci created a rhomboid-shaped compositional setting in which
he portrayed the Madonna being carried upwards towards the sky by angels and
seraphs. He probably borrowed this compositional arrangement from his cousin
Ludovico’s Holy Family with Saints and Donors of 1591 (Figure 18), which was created
as an altarpiece for the Piombini Chapel in the Church of the Cappuccini in Cento,
and is displayed today at the Pinacoteca Civica in Cento.20 The Madonna is at the
centre of the upper part of the painting. Below is her open tomb, surrounded by the
apostles, prominent among whom are St. Peter to the left and St. Paul to the right.
The Madonna forms the upper apex of the rhomboid composition, with the legs of
St. Peter and St. Paul in the lower apex. The obtuse angles are formed by the head of
St. Peter and two other apostles on the left, and by the head of St. Paul and the rest of
the apostles on the right.
The Cerasi Assumption of the Virgin was Annibale’s fourth rendition of the ascend-
ing Madonna with the apostles positioned around the empty tomb. The earliest
examples (1587) are today in Madrid’s Prado and Dresden’s Gemäldegalerie; the third
version, completed five years later (1592), is in Bologna’s Pinacoteca Nazionale. Sig-
nificant differences separate the Madrid, Dresden, and Bologna versions from the
19 Baglione, Le vite de’ pittori, scultori et architetti, I, p. 137; Friedlaender, Caravaggio Studies, p. 231. For the
relationship between Zuccari and Caravaggio, see Friedlaender, ‘Zuccari and Caravaggio’, pp. 27–36. See also
Hinks, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, p. 66.
20 This information is taken from Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, cat. no. 31.
Roman version, emphasizing the painter’s different aims in each depiction of the
scene. While in the three early versions the Madonna’s ascension to Heaven is depict-
ed in a vibrant and dynamic diagonal composition, the Cerasi Madonna’s ascension
is balanced and vertical.
Caravaggio depicted St. Peter at the centre, with his body inverted on the cross. He
is gazing at the nail in his left hand with an expression of agony, while the three exe-
cutioners haul up the cross. He is depicted naked, with his blue garment lying in the
right-hand corner of the composition. The entire group is set against a black back-
ground. As Stephen Pepper observes, ‘Caravaggio has made the struggle between the
Saint’s spiritual force and the nail’s physical force the climax of his painting’.21 The
composition of the St. Peter painting is a cross: St. Peter himself forms the crossbeam
of the cross, from his left hand on the right side to the executioner, dressed in a red
cloth, on the left side. This line is crossed by the two executioners with their backs
to the viewer.
In the painting of St. Paul, Caravaggio portrayed the saint alongside a second
human protagonist, as well as a huge horse that occupies much of the canvas. St.
Paul, who is lying on his back, has just received his revelation. Above him, the horse is
held back by the other figure. The saint’s red garment is placed to the left. Here again,
as in the previous painting, the background is dark. The circular composition is dom-
inated by the saint’s hand movement and the horse’s refusal to step on his master.
Scholars today generally agree that Caravaggio must have seen Annibale Carrac-
ci’s altarpiece before bringing his own paintings to completion. Hinks, for example,
maintained that Caravaggio’s paintings were created in reaction to Annibale’s style,
and that these are his most classical paintings.22 Dempsey similarly claimed that it
was impossible to understand the change in Caravaggio’s style in his paintings for the
Cerasi Chapel without taking into account Annibale’s precedence.23 Hibbard con-
tended that ‘Caravaggio was in a sense thumbing his nose at Annibale’s ideal style’.24
And Catherine Puglisi believed that Caravaggio must have seen Annibale’s painting;
otherwise, it would be impossible to explain that his St. Paul stretches his arms above
his head in the same manner as Annibale’s Madonna.25
There is no doubt that the three paintings are related to one another. The most
obvious connection is that both St. Peter and St. Paul, the main protagonists of Car-
avaggio’s paintings, are also present in Annibale’s painting, where they are promi-
nently displayed in the foreground before the Madonna’s tomb, watching her as she
ascends towards heaven. Both saints are dressed in their traditional outfits: St. Peter
21 Pepper, ‘Caravaggio and Guido Reni’, p. 335.

22 Hinks, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, p. 69.
24 Hibbard, Caravaggio, p. 136.
25 Puglisi, Caravaggio, p. 173; Treffers, ‘Caravaggio’, p. 69.
is clad in a blue dress and yellow toga, and St. Paul is wearing his customary green
tunic and red toga.26
The connection between Caravaggio and Annibale’s paintings is forged by means
of the saints’ garments. Whereas Annibale’s saints are fully dressed in their tradition-
al outfits, Caravaggio has stripped St. Peter bare, leaving him naked on the cross with
his blue garment displayed in the right-hand corner of the painting, in close proximi-
ty to Annibale’s altarpiece. In Caravaggio’s painting of St. Paul, the artist has the saint
dressed in his military outfit, but his red garment is still visible in the left-hand corner
beneath the prostrate saint, closely resembling its location in Annibale’s painting.
The dark background in both of Caravaggio’s paintings accentuates the illumination
of the main protagonists, Peter and Paul.
The connection between Annibale’s and Caravaggio’s paintings is also apparent
in their similar pyramidal structure (Figure 43). In Annibale’s compositional setting,
one saint appears on the left while the other is located on the right, so that they form
the base of the triangle. The celestial Madonna forms the upper apex of a larger tri-
angle, whose base is formed by the inclusion of the two Caravaggio paintings.27
The final point of connection between the works is that in Caravaggio’s paintings,
both St. Peter and St. Paul are depicted in foreshortening, thus directing the viewer’s
gaze to the same figures who are prominently positioned in Annibale’s altarpiece. St.
Peter’s head is close to the Madonna, while St. Paul’s head is located at the opposite
end of the composition. Perhaps the artist’s intention was to point out that St. Peter
was closer to the Madonna, since his martyrdom was about to begin, whereas St. Paul
was still far from his death and had yet to embark on his saintly journey.
The two Caravaggio paintings differ in style from the Carracci altarpiece in terms
of the diffusion of light, and their dark atmosphere contrasts sharply with the bright-
ness of Annibale’s composition. Annibale painted the sky blue, with unnatural
flames rising above the Madonna. His entire colouristic concept is different, with
lighter tones and a lesser contrast of light and shade. Letizia Treves wrote that ‘the
limited colour range in Caravaggio’s lateral paintings contrasts with Annibale Car-
racci’s vibrant Assumption of the Virgin placed above the Altar’.28 This difference in
colouristic scale between the works of the two painters may have been what Malva-
sia tried to emphasize when, in his description of Reni’s life, he quoted the following
statement, supposedly written by Annibale about Caravaggio:
26 To mention a brief iconological precedent, Masaccio depicted St. Peter in the same blue and yellow
garments in the Cappella Brancacci in Santa Maria del Carmine in Florence, and so did Raphael in his
portrayal of the saint in his 1515 tapestries for the Sistine Chapel. Raphael also portrayed St. Paul in green and
red in the same series of tapestries.
27 For this compositional setting, see especially Sybille Ebert-Schifferer, who writes that Annibale’s painting
is ‘a clearly defined and chromatically vibrant pyramidal composition with the Virgin at the top, Peter on the
left, and Paul on the right’. Ebert-Schifferer, Caravaggio, p. 135.
28 Treves, ‘Painting in Rome’, p. 16.
Figure 43: Cappella Cerasi, Santa Maria del Popolo, pyramidal structure.
Does he use a slanting, sharply delimited light? I would like it open and direct.
Does he cover up the difficult parts of art in nighttime shadows? I, by the bright
light of noon, would like to reveal the most learned and erudite of my studies.29
Regardless of whether this passage was written by Annibale or by Malvasia himself, it

serves to emphasize the main stylistic difference between the two painters. A further
difference lies in Annibale’s inclusion of many figures in the composition, whereas
Caravaggio severely restricted the number of figures, even though this choice does
not follow the traditional iconography of the two scenes. In his Cappella Paulina in
29 ‘prende egli un lume serrato, e cadente; & io lo vorrei aperto, e in faccia: cuopre quegli le difficoltà dell’
Arte fra l’ombre della Notte; ed io a un chiaro lume di mezzo giorno vorrei scoprire i più dotti, & eruditi
ricerchi.’ Malvasia, Felsina Pittrice, II, p. 10; For the English translation, see Malvasia, The Life of Guido Reni, p.
44. See also Dempsey, Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style, p. 24; Sohm, ‘Caravaggio’s Deaths’,
p. 458.
the Vatican, for instance, Michelangelo included numerous figures in his depiction of
the same scenes from the lives of St. Peter and St. Paul.
Writing about these stylistic differences, Pepper contended that
The sophisticated language of the art historians does not hide the view that Anni-
bale’s painting is artificial, called by Posner hyperideal. Caravaggio’s paintings are
more real, that is corresponding to observed reality. Perhaps that is exactly their
limitation.30
If we accept that Caravaggio and Annibale’s paintings were meant to complement

one another and that there was a preconceived connection between them, we may
then also understand why Caravaggio’s first versions, painted on cypress wood, were
replaced. Contemporary scholars seem to agree that the version of the Conversion
of St. Paul (Figure 44) in the Odescalchi Balbi Collection is the original. Although
it remains unclear whether the first two versions were replaced by the patron or by
the painter himself, this question is irrelevant for the current discussion.31 What is
important are the changes that Caravaggio introduced into the oil painting, which
can be observed through a simple comparison between the two paintings of St. Paul.
The two fundamental differences that are immediately discernible are the absence
of celestial figures in the later version (as emphasized by Hibbard), whereas in the
early version they are evident in the upper right corner of the painting.32 The sec-
ond change is in the clothing and placement of the saint. Caravaggio switched his
position to the other side of the composition, so that he corresponds to Annibale’s
Madonna, and changed his draperies to accentuate their connection to the image of
St. Paul in the altarpiece. In contrast to the first version of the composition, the oil
painting clearly responds to Annibale’s painting.
In his article on the Caravaggio paintings in the Cerasi Chapel, Leo Steinberg
argued that Caravaggio considered the entire chapel and assumed a focalized point
of view from a distance in order to understand its idea and message. Caravaggio
designed his composition in accordance with a perspective that corresponds to a
specific point of view. This point of view is situated in the anteroom beneath the
Dove of the Holy Ghost, on the vault above the bust portraits of Stefano Cerasi and
his son Tiberio, the commissioner of the decoration. Only from this point of view
can visitors to the chapel behold the paintings in their overall, interconnected con-
text. Steinberg also stressed that the source of light in both paintings comes from the

31 It remains unclear whether it was Cerasi who was not happy with the first two versions or whether
Caravaggio himself was not satisfied with his work. What we do know is that the painter produced a second
version of each scene, and that Cardinal Sannesio bought the first versions from the artist. For the fate of the
two first versions, see Hinks, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, p. 108.
Figure 44: Caravaggio, Conversion of St. Paul, 1600/1, Odescalchi Collection, Rome (Photo: After Sybille
Ebert-Shifferer, Caravaggio: The Artist and His Work, Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2012).
painted sky surrounding the dove. The focalization and source of light create a the-
matic connection between the Caravaggio paintings.33 According to Steinberg, Cara-
vaggio’s choice to design the compositions from a distorted and illusionistic diagonal
33 Steinberg, ‘Observation in the Cerasi Chapel’, p. 185. See also Fried, The Moment of Caravaggio, pp. 147–148.
perspective was due to his intention that they be viewed from the anteroom. Stein-
berg suggested, ‘The remoter parts of both bodies [Peter and Paul] are so pivoted into
the picture space, that their axes become prolongations of our sight lines’.34 St. Peter
and St. Paul in Caravaggio’s paintings thus function as diagonals that stretch toward
the main altar of the chapel.
Caravaggio’s choice clearly assumes a unified whole that includes Carracci’s altar-
piece. In his 1983 book on Caravaggio, Hibbard takes this idea one step further, argu-
ing that Caravaggio deliberately darkened his two paintings in order to achieve an
effect of contrast to Annibale’s bright coloration.35 Once we agree to look at these
three paintings together, the idea of the entire decoration becomes clear. The three
paintings represent conversion, martyrdom, and ascendance to heaven.36 The first
two scenes take place on earth, while the last one occurs in the metaphysical realm.
St. Paul’s conversion is a symbol of what St. Ambrose defined as ‘death to sin’, since
the righteous can no longer sin. St. Peter’s death is a real death, reserved for saints,
while the Madonna’s ascendance is a presentation of the Catholic triumph over
death. In Catholic terms, death is gratifying for the righteous. As Shelley Karen Per-
love has explained, the spiritual perception characteristic of the seventeenth centu-
ry was that the soul dies slowly towards the life of eternity. She quotes François de
Sales, who wrote, ‘The soul that has flowed out into God dies not, for how can she die
by being swallowed up in life?’37 This view can explain the connection between the
Assumption of the Virgin, which represents the Catholic triumph over death,38 and
the two types of death presented on the two walls of the chapel. St. Peter’s death is a
real death. He dies as a saint should die, and his martyrdom is therefore a symbol of
the afterlife. St. Paul dies a second type of death, one that only saints can experience.
His conversion is a symbol of spiritual rebirth as he begins a saintly life. This set of
decorations was obviously appropriate for a Christian burial chapel.
As this discussion has shown, the eclectic combination of two different styles,
such as those of Annibale and Caravaggio, has an iconographical function that
enhances the religious theme of the chapel, with each style used for a different
realm—Caravaggio’s for the earthly realm and Annibale’s for the heavenly realm.
34 Steinberg, ‘Observation in the Cerasi Chapel’, p. 186.

36 Pepper summarizes the idea as that of salvation. Pepper, ‘Caravaggio, Carracci, and the Cerasi Chapel’, p.
115.
37 de Sales, Treatise on the Love of God, p. 267; Perlove, Bernini and the Idealization of Death, p. 38. Posner
attends to the triumph over sin and death in his description of the Dresden version, where the original sin is
represented as a relief of the pedestal of tomb. See Posner, Annibale Carracci, cat. no. 40.
38 For the triumph of the Madonna symbolized by her hand gestures, see also Treffers, ‘The Art and Craft of
Sainthood’, p. 347.
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Index
Abate, Nicolò dell’, 37, 149, 175 Barocci, Federico, 141, 143, 200
Abduction of Rinaldo by Armida, The (Guercino), 190 Bascapè, Carlo, 131
Abraham Casting out Hagar and Ishmael Batteux, Charles: Les Beaux Arts reduits a un même
(Guercino), 83–4, 84 principe, 166
academic art, 30, 180, 182–3, 185, 196, 208 Baudelaire, Charles, 159, 178, 179, 180;
Accademia degli’ Incamminati, 37, 38n21, 95, 200 Art in Paris 1845–1862, 177
Academia di San Luca, 46, 209, 216 Bell, Janis, 90
Adam and Eve, 57–9, 63, 88, 181, 182 belle nature, 159
Adoration of the Magi (Agostino Carracci), 64 bellezza and diformità, 71, 100
Aesop, 45 Bellori, Giovanni Pietro, 25, 46, 47–8, 59, 60, 61, 90, 98,
Agucchi, Monsignor Giovanni Battista, 25, 46–7, 48, 73, 99, 159, 192, 195;
76–7, 89–90, 95, 186, 188–191, 196, 198, 200; Vite, 47, 58, 75, 76, 77, 88–90, 147–8, 150, 188, 210, 212
Impresa per dipingere l’historia d’Erminia che si Bentivoglio Chapel, 113
racconta nel principio del settimo libro del Bernini, 194
Godfredo del Tasso, 189; biretta, 133, 134
relationships with painters, 186–9 Bissell, Ward: ‘Annibale Carracci,’ 197n127
Albani, Francesco, 26, 36, 110, 147–8, 153, 162, 164, Blanc, Charles, 191–3, 202;
210, 211 Grammaire des arts du dessin, 192;
Albergato, Achile, 80 Histoire des peintres de toutes les écoles, 193
Alberti, Durante, 99 Blunt, Anthony, 39
Alberti, Leon Battista: On Painting, 44 Bohemianism, 160, 208
Aldrovandi, Ulisse, 63, 67–8 Boime, Albert: Thomas Couture and the Eclectic
Alliance between Disegno and Colore (Reni), 59, 61, 75, Vision, 171, 173
77–80, 84, 88, 152, Plate 3 Bolla della Canonizatione di San Carlo, La, 129
Amayden, Teodoro, 210 Bolus-Reichert, Christine, 21, 52;
Angel, Philips: ‘Praise of painting,’ 45 Age of Eclecticism, The, 22, 185
Angeloni, Francesco, 58 Borromeo, St. Carlo, 63, 128–31;
Apollonius of Tyana, 48 Instructions on Ecclesiastical Building, 127n41, 129–30;
ara coeli, 127 portrayals of, 128–41
arbitrary eclecticism, 40, 46–8, 52 Boschloo, Anton: Annibale Carracci in Bologna, 62, 64
Archangel St. Michael, The (Reni), 74, 74–5, 150, 164 Brizio, Francesco, 50
Archiginnasio, 130 Brucker, Johann Jacob, 191;
Armenini, Giovanni Battista, 25, 39 History of Philosophy, The, 164, 165
Arpino, Cavalier d’, 28, 115, 192 Buchanan, William: Memoirs of Painting, 167
Ascension of the Madonna (Costa), 106, 108 Buoi family chapel, 106
assemblage, 20, 40, 46, 48, 63, 88, 141, 163, 192 Burckhardt, Jacob, 179;
assimilated eclecticism, 20, 33, 40, 41–5, 91–2 Cicerone, 176–7
Assumption of the Virgin (1600) (Annibale Carracci), 117, Burial and Reception into Heaven of St. Petronilla
211, 212, 216, 217–18 (Guercino), 121
Assumption of the Virgin (Reni), 117–19 Burke, Peter: Italian Renaissance, The, 185n87
Assumption of the Virgin with the Twelve Apostles (Reni), Butcher’s Shop (Annibale Carracci), 143, 145, 145–6
116, 117
Assunta (Annibale Carracci), 181, 216 Calvaert, Denys, 27, 117, 117n19
Campbell, Stephen J.: “The Carracci,” 96
Baglione, Giovanni, 212, 216 Caravaggio, 135, 160, 176, 182, 183, 192, 195, 201, 209, 210,
Baldinucci, Filippo, 24, 91n92 214–16;
Ballanche, Pierre-Simon: Essais sur les institutions Conversion of St. Paul (1600/1), 220, 221;
sociales, 168 Conversion of St. Paul (1604), 212, 214, 217–18, 220–22;
Ballini, Gasparo, 44 Crucifixion of St. Peter, 212, 213, 217–18;
Balzac, Honoré de, 171, 179; Entombment, 132;
Le Chef-d’oeuvre inconnu, 178 in the manner of, 115, 117;
Baptism of Christ (Annibale Carracci), 141–3, 142 St. Matthew and the Angel, 210, 211
Barasch, Moshe, 24 Carracci, 22, 25, 36, 62, 131, 135, 160, 162, 166, 171, 173, 174,
Barberini, Antonio, Cardinal of Sant’Onofrio, 74 175, 176, 179, 181, 184, 185, 192, 197–200;
Barberini, Antonio, Pope Urban VIII’s nephew, 150 collaboration between, 95;
Barbieri, Giovanni Francesco. see Guercino giving of the Fleece, The, 96;
Barelli da Nizza, Francesco Luigi, 130–31 Medea’s Enchantments, 96;
Palazzo Fava, 88, 95, 96–7; Cimabue, 134

see also Accademia degli’ Incamminati; Clement VIII, 209, 212
Carracci, Agostino; Clouet, François, 182
Carracci, Annibale; colore, 75, 76, 78, 80, 81, 82, 83, 87, 88, 152, 174
Carracci, Ludovico colour, 113–15
Carracci, Agostino, 38–9, 64, 76–7, 89, 91, 96, 164, 201; Comanini, Gregorio, 75;
Adoration of the Magi, 64; Il Figino, 73
Last Communion of St. Jerome, 136–8, 137, 138, 139; componimento, 20 see also assemblage
Sonetto in lode di Nicolò Bolognese, 36–8, 39, 162, 174, Comte, Auguste, 24
175, 177, 180, 181, 182, 191, 197 connoisseurship, 24
Carracci, Annibale, 21, 22–3, 25, 26, 43, 46, 61, 62, 76–7, Constable, John, 178
89, 96, 99, 141, 147, 148–50, 162, 163, 164, 166, 178, 185, Conversion of St. Paul, The (Ludovico Carracci), 119
189–90, 196, 200, 201–2, 207, 210, 213–16; Conversion of St. Paul (1600/1) (Caravaggio), 220, 221
Assumption of the Virgin (1600), 117, 211, 212, 216, Conversion of St. Paul (1604) (Caravaggio), 212, 214,
217–18; 217–18, 220–22
Assunta, 181, 216; coronae, 127
Baptism of Christ, 141–3, 142; Coronation of the Virgin (Annibale Carracci), 213
Butcher’s Shop, 143, 145, 145–6; Coronation of the Virgin (Reni), 117
Coronation of the Virgin, 213; Correggio, 47, 50, 58, 91, 96, 113, 141, 143, 146, 147, 148,
Crucifixion with Saints Bernard di Siena, Francis, 149, 150, 162, 163, 166, 167, 171, 172, 175, 177, 180, 181,
Petronius, John, and Mourners, 139–41, 140; 182, 194, 197, 200;
Galleria Farnese, 177, 194, 214, 216; Madonna of St. Sebastian, 41
Jason Carried in a Coffin to Cheiron’s Cave, 97, 97–8; Correggio, Giovanni Donato, 85
Ludovico, comparison to, 109; Cortona, Pietro da, 176
Madonna and Child Enthroned with St. John the Cosimo II, Grand Duke of Tuscany, 120
Baptist, St. John the Evangelist and St. Catherine of Costa, Lorenzo: Ascension of the Madonna, 106, 108
Alexandria, 148–9, 171–2, Plate 8; Council of Trent, 62, 63, 129
Madonna with Six Saints, 197; Courbet, Gustave, 183
Pietà (1585), 143; Cousin, Victor, 34, 169, 171, 173, 174, 180, 207;
Pietà (1599), 194; Du vrai, du beau, et du bien, 45, 168–9, 170
Pietà (1603), 113, 115, 115; Crucifixion of St. Peter (Caravaggio), 212, 213, 217–18,
Pietà with the Three Maries, 167; 220–22
Rest on the Flight to Egypt, 167; Crucifixion of St. Peter (Reni), 119
Three Marys at the Tomb, 113–15, 114, 128 Crucifixion with Saints Bernard di Siena, Francis,
Carracci, Ludovico, 21, 26, 28, 50, 60, 61, 89, 90–91, 121, Petronius, John, and Mourners (Annibale
148, 162, 164, 166, 171, 177, 200, 207; Carracci), 139–41, 140
Annibale, comparison to, 109;
Conversion of St. Paul, The, 119; Death of Agostino Carracci (Delaroche), 174
Ermina and the Shepherds, 189; Decamps, Alexandre-Gabriel, 171
Holy Family with St. Francis and Donors, The, 119, 120, decorum, 62, 93, 93–4n98
216; Dejob, Charles, 64
Lambertini Chapel, 98–100; Delacroix, Eugène, 171, 173
Madonna of the Scalzi, The, 112, 113, 194, 197; Delaroche, Paul, 180;
Paradise, 124–6, 125; Death of Agostino Carracci, 174;
relationship with Agucchi, 188–9; Hémicycle des Beaux-arts, 172–3, 173–4
St. Jerome, 106, 107; delicato, 80, 132
St. Michael and St. George altarpiece, 13, 17, 18–20, 52, Dempsey, Charles, 38, 90, 113;
92–3, 94, 141, 195, Plate 1; Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque
Trinity with the Dead Christ, The, 194; Style, 22–3, 43–4, 76, 143, 185, 198–200, 201–2, 217
Virgin Appearing to St. Hyacinth, The, 106–10, Plate 4 Descent from the Cross (Le Sueur), 169–70, 170
Catholic Reformation, 21, 129, 215 Deposition (Pontormo), 143, 144
celestial realm, 18–19, 57, 69, 105, 106–28, 132 Dickerson, Claude Douglas: Raw Painting, 143
Cerasi, Monsignor Tiberio, 212 Diderot, Denis, 160, 164;
Cerasi Chapel, 194, 212–22, 219 ‘Eclectisme,’ 165, 191
Cesi, Pier Donato, 130 differentiation of styles, 14, 29, 113, 114, 117, 124, 127, 132,
Chantelou, Paul Fréart de, 86 136, 138, 174
chiaroscuro, 19, 96, 97, 98, 114, 149 disegno, 75, 76, 78, 80, 81, 82, 83, 87, 88, 152, 174
Christ at the Column (Reni), 119 Disegno and Colore (Guercino), 59, 75, 77, 80–83, 84,
Cicero, 48 87–8, Plate 2
Cignani, Carlo, 110; Dolce, Lodovico, 35–6, 39, 47, 78, 82–3, 90;
Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, 153, 153, 154 Dialogo della pittura or L’Aretino, 44, 80
INDEX 227
Domenichino, 26, 36, 46, 58–9, 162, 164, 171, 173, 178, Fuseli, Henry, 174–5, 176, 179;
188, 210, 211; Lectures on Painting, 175–6
God the Father Rebuking Adam and Eve, 59, 60;
Truth Disclosed by Time, 190 Galen, 34
Domine Quo Vadis (Cerasi Chapel), 213 Garbieri, Lorenzo, 26;
Donini, Pierluigi, 164 Proclamation of the Barnabites’ Rule, The, 132–3, 134
Dubois de Saint-Gelais, Louis-François, 163 Garisendi Chapel, 110
Dufresnoy, Charles-Alphonse: De Arte Graphica, 146–7 Gash, John: ‘Hannibal Carrats,’ 146
Dulcini, Bartolomeo, 189 Ginzburg, Carlo: ‘Morelli, Freud and Sherlock
Dürer, Albrecht, 58, 113, 178 Holmes,’ 24
Giordano, Luca, 176
Ebert-Schifferer, Sybille: Caravaggio, 218n27 Giorgione, 47, 136, 216
eclecticism, 26, 207–8; Giovannini, Giacopo, 49, 50
as academic endeavor, 180, 182–3, 196, 208; giudizio (judgment), 38, 46, 200
criticism of, 21–2, 168, 174–82, 195; Giustiniani, Marchese Vincenzo, 210–12, 215
defining, 33–40, 91–2; giving of the Fleece, The (Carracci), 96
history of term, 24, 26, 33–4, 150, 162, 164, 167, 207; God the Father Rebuking Adam and Eve
ideology, 57–100; (Domenichino), 59, 60
learning from others and, 36–40, 41, 43–5, 51; Goldstein, Carl, 146, 201;
Mahon’s definition of, 191–2; Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, 24–5
practice of, 105–54; Gombrich, Ernst: Norm and Form, 43
rejection of term, 185, 193, 196–7; Grattarola, Marco Aurelio, 129
as stylistic device, 21–2, 207; grazia, 78
theory of selection, 191; Grazia, Diana de: ‘Drawings as Means to an End,’ 36
types of, 40–52 Greenberg, Clement: ‘Avant-Garde and Kitsch,’ 183
eclectic school of painting, 27, 175, 177 Greene, Thomas: Light in Troy, The, 35, 40
Elijah Fed by Ravens (Guercino), 185–8, 186 Gregory XV, 120, 188, 190
Entombment (Caravaggio), 132 Grimaldi, Cristoforo and Paride, 18
Entombment (Titian), 132 Guercino, 21, 26, 29, 36, 81–2, 119–21, 160, 164, 171, 173,
Erminia and the Shepherds (Ludovico Carracci), 189 185, 195, 200, 207;
estremi, 99 Abduction of Rinaldo by Armida, The, 190;
Exposition universelle, 171 Abraham Casting out Hagar and Ishmael, 83–4, 84;
Eyck, Jan van, 58 Burial and Reception into Heaven of St. Petronilla, 121,
186;
Faberio, Lucio, 37, 38–9 creative process, 82n72, 88;
Farmers Presenting Gifts to St. Benedict, The (Reni), 49, Disegno and Colore, 59, 75–83, 84, 87–8, Plate 2;
50–51 Elijah Fed by Ravens, 185–8, 186;
Farquhar, Maria, 179; Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, 152, 153–4;
Biographical Catalogue of the Principal Italian relationship with Agucchi, 186–8, 189;
Painters, 177 St. Francis, 185–8, 187;
Feigenbaum, Gail, 113, 126; St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in
‘Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Purgatory, 121–4, 122, 123, 126, Plate 6;
Style by Charles Dempsey,’ 90; St. Peter Standing before the Madonna, 121, 126–8,
Ludovico Carracci, 25, 98, 109 Plate 5;
Ferdinando, Duke of Mantua, 120 St. Petronilla altarpiece, 186;
fiero, 132 St. William of Aquitaine in front of Pope
Figino, Ambrogio, 131 Gregory VII, 173;
Figino, Il (Comanini), 73 Self-Portrait before a Painting of “Amor Fedele,” 85,
Fioravanti family, 110 85–6, 87, 87n80;
Firenzuola, Agnolo, 35, 47; Sibilla Samia, 161;
Dialogo delle bellezze delle donne, 34 Triumph of Aurora, The, 121, 121n29
Flaubert, Gustave, 171 Gullick, Thomas John, 179;
Fontana, Lavinia, 63 Painting Popularly Explained, 177–8
Fontana, Prospero, 64
Fra Bartolommeo, 43, 109, 110, 150 halos, 127
Freedberg, Sydney J., 64; Hémicycle des Beaux-arts (Delaroche), 172–3, 173–4
Circa 1600, 113 Heywood, Florence: Important Pictures of the Louvre,
Friedlaender, Walter, 188, 201; The, 180
Mannerism and Anti-Mannerism in Italian Hibbard, Howard: Caravaggio, 217, 220, 222
Painting, 144, 184; Hinks, Roger: Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, 217
‘Zuccari and Caravaggio,’ 183–4 Holbein, Hans, 178
Hoeber, Arthur: ‘Painting of the Nineteenth Century in MacComb, Arthur: Baroque Painters of Italy, The,
France,’ 182 180–81
Holy Family with St. Francis and Donors, The (Ludovico Malevich Kazimir, 27
Carracci), 119, 120, 216 Mazarin, Jules, 120
Hugo, Victor, 171 McTighe, Sheila, 145–6
Hutson, James, 34; Maderno, Carlo, 215
Early Modern Art Theory, 46 Madonna and Child Enthroned with St. John the
Baptist, St. John the Evangelist and St. Catherine
images: power of, 17–18, 64; of Alexandria (Annibale Carracci), 148–9, 171–2,
veneration of, 65–6 Plate 8
imitation (imitare), 21, 22, 23, 25, 35, 36, 39n27, 46, 47, Madonna and Child with Beato Filippo Neri (Reni), 118,
48, 65, 66, 73, 78, 150, 175, 192, 195, 200; 119
Winckelmann idea of 165–6 Madonna and Child with St. Mary Magdalene and St.
Ingres, Jean-Auguste-Dominique, 171, 173 Hyacinth (Reni), 110, 111, 111–13
inventione, 24 Madonna of St. Sebastian (Correggio), 41
Madonna of the Scalzi, The (Ludovico Carracci), 112,
James, John Thomas: Italian School of Painting, The, 167 113, 194, 197
Jameson, Anne, 179; Madonna with Six Saints (Annibale Carracci), 197
Companion to the Most Celebrated Private Galleries of Mahon, Sir Denis, 13, 20, 26, 36, 81–2, 160, 162, 184–8,
Art in London, 177 189–92, 193–5, 198, 200, 201, 202, 208;
Jamot, Paul: ‘French Painting-II,’ 182–3 ‘Afterthoughts on the Carracci Exhibition,’ 95–6,
Jason Carried in a Coffin to Cheiron’s Cave (Annibale 109, 194;
Carracci), 97, 97–8 ‘On Some Aspects of Caravaggio and His Times,’ 146;
John of Damascus, 72 Studies in Seicento Art and Theory, 183, 184, 188,
John the Deacon, 72 189–90, 191, 193
Jones, Pamela, 70 Mainardi, Patricia, 169
Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife (Cignani), 153, 153, 154 Malevich, 115, 194
Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife (Guercino), 152, 153–4 Malvasia, Count Carlo Cesare, 14, 17, 37, 41, 59, 60–61,
Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife (Reni), 151, 152–3 75–6, 80, 105, 110, 132, 165, 181, 207;
judgment (giudizio), 38, 46, 200 Bellori comparison to, 88–90, 98–9;
juste milieu, 99, 160, 168–9, 174, 179, 180, 207 Il Claustro di San Michele in Bosco di Bologna, 38,
50, 89;
Kandinsky, 27 criticism of, 89–90;
Kent, William, 160 Felsina Pittrice, 17, 19, 26, 27–8, 33, 50, 77, 88–99, 106,
Kerber, Peter Björn, 152 109–10, 113, 117, 136, 141, 148–9, 218–19;
Kugler, Franz, 178, 179; Le pitture di Bologna, 89, 94–5
Handbook of Painting, 176 Mancini, Giulio: Considerazioni sulla pittura, 24, 25, 198
Mannerism, 46, 94, 113, 141, 143, 150, 176, 191, 197, 199
Laertius, Diogenes, 34 Manzini, Giovanni Battista, 93
Lambertini chapel, 88, 98–100, 172 Mariette, 160
Lancellotti, Secondo: L’Hoggidi overo il mondo non Martin, John Rupert: ‘The Butcher’s Shop of the
peggiore ne più calamitoso del passato, 35 Carracci,’ 145
Lanfranco, Giovanni, 121, 190 Masaccio, 43
Lanzi, Luigi: History of Painting in Italy, 160, 171 Massani, Giovanni, 74, 150;
Laocoön, 76 Diverse figure, 46
Last Communion of St. Jerome (Agostino Carracci), Massari, Lucio, 50
136–8, 137, 138, 139 Medea’s Enchantments (Carracci), 96
Lee, Rensselaer W.: ‘Review,’ 195–6 Michelangelo, 43, 44, 50, 58, 113, 146, 147, 148, 162, 163,
Lemaistre, John Gustavus: Travels after the Peace of 166, 167, 175, 177, 180, 182, 195, 201, 216, 220;
Amiens, 167 Moses, 41;
Leonardo, 43, 150 Pietà, 132
Le Sueur, Eustache: Descent from the Cross, 169–70, 170 mimesis, 166
light, 113–14 mixture (misto), 26, 40, 43, 48, 63, 92, 141, 147, 148, 191
Ligorio, Pirro, 64 mode or module, 71, 94n99
Lipsius, Justus: Manductio ad stoicam philosophiam, 34 Mondrian, 27, 115, 194
Loh, Maria H.: ‘New and Improved,’ 24, 26, 148 Montaigne, Michel de: Essays, 34
Lomazzo, Giovanni Paolo, 39, 47, 59, 63, 88, 90, 91, 94, Monte, Francesco Maria del, 209, 216
113, 181, 182, 184; Morselli, Raffaella: ‘Bologna,’ 77
Idea del tempio della pittura, 57–8, 66n28, 127, 136 Moses (Michelangelo), 41
Louis Philip, 168 mozzetta, 132, 133, 134
Ludovisi, Niccolò, 80 muscoli, 80
lumi and tenebre, 71, 100 Muzio, Girolamo: Dell’Arte poetica, 35
INDEX 229
nature, 21, 57, 66–9, 70 Primaticcio, 37, 175

naturale and fantasia, 99 Proclamation of the Barnabites’ Rule, The
non-assimilated eclecticism, 20, 21, 23, 29, 40, 48–52, (Garbieri), 132–3, 134
59–60, 63, 77, 91, 92, 94, 99, 105, 148, 207 Proclus, 48
non so che, 78 Prodi, Paolo, 62, 64, 67–8, 141, 209
Noyes, Ruth S., 63, 127 Puglisi, Catherine, 217
Opera Pia dei Poveri Mendicanti, 130 Quatremère de Quincy, Antoine-Chrysostome : modèle
originality, 24, 179 intérieur, 199
Paleotti, Cardinal Gabriele, 18, 27, 63, 64, 124, 126, 129, Raphael, 19, 41–5, 47, 52, 58, 78, 113, 146, 147, 148, 149,
207, 208, 209–10, 216; 150, 160, 161, 162, 167, 169, 175, 177, 180, 182, 195,
De tollendis imaginum abusibus novissima 196, 198;
consideration, 209; St. John the Baptist in the Desert, 161;
Discorso intorno alle imagini sacre et profane, 21, School of Athens, 41;
23–4, 26, 31, 33, 36, 57, 59, 60, 62–75, 88, 93, 105, Sistine Madonna, 194;
128, 138, 151, 209; Stanza della Segnatura, 136
influence of, 62–3, 64 Reni, Guido, 21, 27–8, 36, 60, 61, 74, 77, 115, 160, 164, 171,
Palma Vecchio, 167 173, 174, 200, 207, 210, 211;
Paradise (Ludovico Carracci), 124–6, 125 Alliance between Disegno and Colore, 59, 61, 75–80,
paragone, 78 84, 88, 152, Plate 3;
Parmigianino, 94, 149, 166, 172; Archangel St. Michael, The, 74, 74–5, 150–51, 164;
Vision of St. Jerome, 41, 42 Assumption of the Virgin, 117–19;
Parrhasius, 48 Assumption of the Virgin with the Twelve Apostles,
Passeri, Giovanni Battista, 119 116, 117;
Passignano, 166 Caravaggesque period, 29, 115;
pastiche (pasticcio), 26, 48, 50, 51, 52 Christ at the Column, 119;
Pepper, Stephen, 111; Cleopatra, 161;
‘Annibale Carracci and the Beginnings of Baroque Style Coronation of the Virgin, 117;
by Charles Dempsey,’ 38n23, 201; Crucifixion of St. Peter, 119;
‘Caravaggio, Carracci, and the Cerasi Chapel,’ 213–14, Farmers Presenting Gifts to St. Benedict, The, 49,
220; 50–51;
‘Caravaggio and Guido Reni,’ 217; Garisendi Chapel altarpiece, 110–11;
Guido Reni, 110, 117–19, 117n19, 200–201 Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife, 151, 152–3;
Perlove, Shelley Karen, 222 Madonna and Child with Beato Filippo Neri, 118, 119;
Perugino, 43 Madonna and Child with St. Mary Magdalene and St.
Phidias, 48 Hyacinth, 110, 111, 111–13;
Piacenza, Giuseppe da, 93 Pietà dei Mendicanti, 128, 131–6, 133, 135, Plate 7;
Picasso, 27, 115, 194 Vergine Addolorata, 161
Pietà (1585) (Annibale Carracci), 143 Rest on the Flight to Egypt (Annibale Carracci), 167
Pietà (1599) (Annibale Carracci), 194 Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 44, 197;
Pietà (1603) (Annibale Carracci), 113, 115, 115 Discourses, 39–40, 45, 166–7
Pietà dei Mendicanti (Reni), 128, 131–6, 133, 135, Plate 7 Richardson, Jonathan: Discourse on the Dignity,
Pietà (Michelangelo), 132 Certainty, Pleasure and Advantage, of the Science of
Pietà with the Three Maries (Annibale Carracci), 167 a Connoisseur, 163
Piles, Roger de: Abrégé de la vie des peintres, 163; Richelieu, 120
Idea of the Perfect Painting, 24 ritrarre (portayal), 47, 73
Pilkington, Matthew: Dictionary of Painters, 166 Robertson, Clare: ‘Annibale Carracci and Invenzione’,
Pino, Paolo, 90; 141, 143
Dialogo di Pittura, 24, 35, 39, 47, 57, 58, 82–3 Rocco, Patricia: Devout Hand, The, 63
Piombo, Sebastiano del, 198 rochette, 132, 134
Pius IV, 129, 130 Romano, Giulio, 109, 110, 146, 147, 166
Pontormo: Deposition, 143, 144 Romanticism, 160, 174, 179, 180, 208
portrayal (ritrarre), 47, 73 Rubens, 161, 198;
portrayals of saints, 57, 71–3, 128–41 Self-Portrait with His Brother Philip Rubens, Justus
Posner, Donald, 13, 190, 220; Lipsius and Johannes Woverius, 161
Annibale Carracci, 89–90, 149–50, 197–8, 201; Ruskin, John: Modern Painters, 178
‘Domenichino and Lanfranco,’ 121n29, 190n100
postille, 25 sacra picta, 64
Poussin, Nicholas, 94n99, 169, 170, 178, 201; St. Ambrose, 222
Self-Portrait, 86, 86–7 St. Anthony, 69
St. Augustine, 66, 69 Tacconi, Innocenzio, 212–13;

St. Benedict (Guido Reni), 49, 50 Domine Quo Vadis, 213;
St. Francis, 134 St. Paul in Ecstasy, 213
St. Francis (Guercino), 185–8, 187 Tassi, Agostino, 190
St. Gregory the Great, 65, 124 Tasso, Torquato: Discorsi dell’arte poetica, 34–5
St. Gregory the Great with the Souls Suffering in taste (gusto), 26
Purgatory (Guercino), 121–4, 122, 123, 126, Plate 6 Terpstra, Nicholas: Cultures of Charity, 130
St. Hyacinth, 109 terrestrial realm, 18–19, 57, 69, 105, 106–28, 132
St. Jerome, 69, 106 terribile and amoroso, 99
St. Jerome (Ludovico Carracci), 106, 107 Testa, Pietro, 78
St. Matthew and the Angel (Caravaggio), 210, 211 Three Marys at the Tomb (Annibale Carracci), 113–15,
St. Michael and St. George altarpiece (Ludovico 114, 128
Carracci), 17, 18–20, 52, 92, 94, 141, 195, Plate 1 Tiarini, Alessandro, 26, 50
St. Paul, 69 Tibaldi, Domenico, 64, 109, 110, 166, 175
St. Paul in Ecstasy (Cerasi Chapel), 213 Tintoretto, 113, 166, 198
St. Peter Standing before the Madonna Titian, 50, 58, 91, 136, 146, 147, 148, 149, 150, 160, 161, 163,
(Guercino), 121, 126–8, Plate 5 166, 172, 175, 177, 178, 181, 182, 197;
St. Proculus, 135 Entombment, 132;
St. William of Aquitaine in front of Pope Gregory VII Venus of Urbino, 161
(Guercino), 173 Treves, Letizia: ‘Painting in Rome,’ 218
saints, portrayals of, 57, 71–3, 128–41 Tribuna of the Uffizi, The (Zoffany), 161, 161–2
Sales, François de, 222 Tridentine Style, 62
Samoggia, Luigi, 127 Trinity with the Dead Christ, The (Ludovico
San Paolo, Leone di, 123 Carracci), 194
Sarto, Andrea del, 166 Triumph of Aurora, The (Guercino), 121
Scannelli, Francesco: Microcosmo della pittura, 36 truth, 21, 57, 66–9, 70
Schidone, Bartolomeo, 26 Truth Disclosed by Time (Domenichino), 190
School of Athens (Raphael), 41 Turner, Nicholas, 81–2;
Scott Brown, Denise, 13 Paintings of Guercino, The, 124
selective imitation, 22–3, 199 Tyrius, Maximus, 48
Self-Portrait before a Painting of “Amor Fedele”
(Guercino), 85, 85–6, 87 Úbeda de los Cobos, Andrés: ‘Venus, Adonis and
Self-Portrait (Poussin), 86, 86–7 Cupid,’ 26
Serra, Jacopo, 120 Urban XIII, 120, 150
Seymour, Howard, 96
Seznec, Jean: ‘Stendhal et les peintres Bolonais,’ 173 Vaghezza, 78
Shearman, John, 41 Vasari, Giorgio, 44, 78, 196;
Sigonio, Carlo, 67–8; Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and
Historia Bononiensis, 68 Architects, 20, 25, 41–3, 64, 134, 200, 202
Sirleto, Gugliemo, 68 Venturi, Lionello: Italian Painting, 181–2
Sistine Madonna (Raphael), 194 Venturi, Robert, 13
Sociology, 24 Vernet, Horace, 171
Sohm, Philip, 81; vero, 21, see also nature
‘Gendered Style,’ 78–9, 83; Veronese, 96, 141, 143, 149, 150, 166, 172, 178, 194, 197, 200
Style in the Art Theory of Early Modern Italy, 27 verosimile, 21, see also truth
Sonetto in lode di Nicolò Bolognese, 36–8, 39, 175, 177, vice, 19, 69–71, 105
180, 181, 197 Virgin Appearing to St. Hyacinth, The (Ludovico
Spada, Bernardino, 120 Carracci), 106–10, Plate 4
Spear, Richard, 59 virtue, 19, 69, 70–71, 105
Speroni, Sperone: Dialogo d’amore, 79 Vision of St. Jerome (Parmigianino), 41, 42
Spezzaferro, Luigi, 215 Vouet, Simon, 182
Stanza della Segnatura (Raphael), 136 Vulgate, 106
Steinberg, Leo: ‘The Glorious Company,’ 51;
‘Guercino’s Saint Petronilla,’ 121, 186n91; Waagen, Gustav Friedrich, 145, 167
‘Observation in the Cerasi Chapel,’ 220–22 Waterhouse, Ellis, 113;
Stendhal: Écoles Italiennes de peinture, 171–3, 174 Italian Baroque Painting, 117, 197
Stone, David: Guercino: Master Draftsman, 81–2, 82n72; Whistler, James Abbott McNeill: Ten O’clock, 193
‘Theory and Practice in Seicento Art,’ 189 Winckelmann, Johann Joachim, 20, 159, 160, 164, 165,
stylistic diversity, 13, 17, 21, 71 166, 168, 179, 191, 195, 198, 207;
stylistic evolution, 27–8, 185–8, 190, 195 Abhandlung von der Fähigkeit der Empfindung des
Schönen in der Kunst, 162;
INDEX 231
Reflections on the Imitation of the Painting and Zeller, Eduard: Philosophie der Griechen, 178–9
Sculpture of the Greeks, 164, 174 Zeuxis, 35, 47
Wittkower, Rudolph: Art and Architecture in Italy, Zoffany, Johann: Tribuna of the Uffizi, The, 161,
149–50, 196; 161–2
The Drawings of the Carracci, 196; Zuccari, Federico, 183, 184, 195, 216
‘Imitation, Eclecticism, and Genius,’ 21–2, 45, 196–7
Wornum, Ralph N., 179;
Epochs of Painting Characterized, The, 177

Redefining Eclecticism in Early Modern Bolognese Painting

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V I S U A L A N D M AT E R I A L C U LT U R E , 13 0 0 -17 0 0

Amsterdam University Press

Cover design: Coördesign, Leiden

isbn 978 94 6298 601 5

© D.M. Unger/ Amsterdam University Press B.V., Amsterdam 2019

List of Plates and Figures 9

Black & White Figures

The intriguing stylistic diversity of Bolognese painting had a tremendous impact on

This book is dedicated to Dina, my companion in life who encouraged me more

Daniel M. Unger, Jerusalem, 2018

In this short passage, Malvasia, the seventeenth-century biographer of the Bolognese

In this comparison, Malvasia is obviously conveying a highly personal view, yet

In keeping with this [the acceptance of selective borrowing as central to artistic

According to Wittkower, we might either admire or excoriate the same works,

Defending eclecticism is notoriously difficult since there is no particular visual or

9 Wittkower, ‘Imitation, Eclecticism, and Genius’, p. 154.

that discussion of the question of imitation, under the misnomer of eclecticism,

In the above-quoted passage, Dempsey acknowledges the connection between prac-

12 See also Feigenbaum, Ludovico Carracci, p. li.

15 Loh, ‘New and Improved’, p. 477.

Goldstein discusses the Carracci painters in relation to seventeenth-century artistic

This description calls to mind the sixteenth-century methods described by writers

20 Goldstein, Visual Fact over Verbal Fiction, pp. 34–35.

23 Loh, ‘New and Improved’, p. 484.

Malvasia stresses Reni’s absorption of a second style. Later on in his account, he

Keywords: Eclecticism, Ludovico Carracci, Sonetto in lode di Nicolò B

Dolce similarly mentioned Zeuxis and his selection:

Whoever a goodly painter seeks to be

The awesome Michelangelo must see,

Tibaldi’s basis, and his decoration,

But leaving so much study and vexation,

Read in a straightforward manner, the sonnet appears to provide a summary of the

knowledgeable, and open-minded painter. It is also possible to offer a third reading

25 ‘la fierezza, e sicurezza di Michelangelo, la morbidezza, e delicatezza di Titiano, la gratia, e maestà di

several masters is a highly efficient way of mastering techniques of painting well,

28 Reynolds, Discourses, pp. 95–100.

Assimilated Eclecticism – Vasari’s Raphael

30 Shearman, Only Connect, p. 239.

Vasari named Masaccio, Leonardo, and Michelangelo, as well as the Florentine

40 Reynolds, Discourses, p. 104.

Arbitrary eclecticism in seventeenth-century artistic discourse is evident in the artis-

44 Bell, ‘Introduction’, p. 10.

Non-Assimilated Eclecticism – A Definition

One example of the second type of non-assimilated eclecticism is Ludovico’s

63 Bolus-Reichert, The Age of Eclecticism, p. 42.

The ideological justification for non-assimilated eclecticism is found in Gabriele Paleotti’s

The idea of non-assimilated eclecticism is also evident in Malvasia’s attempt to

of local Bolognese eclecticism. A comparison between Malvasia’s biography of

Gabriele Paleotti’s Discourse on Sacred Images

In his introduction to the recent English translation (2012) of Paleotti’s Discourse,

A recent attempt to show Paleotti’s influence on the Bolognese painter Lavinia

10 Rocco, The Devout Hand, p. 63.

As it is difficult to comprehend divinity, a translation of what cannot be seen in real

is clear about the importance of depicting a portrait as naturally as possible: ‘we

This statement seems to be an attempt by Comanini to give concrete expression to

49 Dooley, Italy in the Baroque, p. 429.

in mind either Paleotti’s contrast between representations of vice and virtue or

A Pictorial Manifest: Alliance between Disegno and Colore

A visual expression of an eclectic approach can be found in Guido Reni’s unique

54 Cited in Morselli, ‘Bologna’, p. 152.

57 Morselli, ‘Bologna’, p. 146.

69 Sohm, ‘Gendered Style’, p. 800.

Carlo Cesare Malvasia and the Assemblage of Styles

List of Plates and Figures 9