Caravaggisti
The Caravaggisti were the international wave of painters who took up Caravaggio's revolution in the first half of the 17th century. His tenebrism - ordinary models thrown out of blackness by raking light - proved contagious: Bartolomeo Manfredi packaged it in his 'method' of half-length genre-like scenes, Orazio and Artemisia Gentileschi carried it through Rome and beyond, Jusepe de Ribera made it the language of Spanish Naples, and Utrecht painters like Gerrit van Honthorst brought candlelit night pieces home to the Netherlands. Working without idealization, they treated sacred and mythological stories as street events, catching gestures mid-motion and faces mid-thought. The style's influence ran through Rembrandt's generation and made dramatic naturalism a European common property.
Defining characteristics
- Tenebrism: figures slashed out of deep darkness by directed light
- Unidealized, working-class models - dirt, wrinkles and all
- Sacred stories staged as contemporary street scenes
- Half-length compositions and cropped gestures caught mid-action (the 'Manfredi method')
- Candlelit nocturnes and dramatic psychological immediacy
Key figures
- Bartolomeo Manfredi (1582-1622) — Diffuser of Caravaggio's manner through his half-length 'method'
- Orazio Gentileschi (1563-1639) — Refined Caravaggesque painter of lyrical religious scenes
- Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-c. 1656) — Dramatic history painter of heroines and martyrdoms
- Jusepe de Ribera (1591-1652) — Spanish Naples master of martyrdoms and naturalist figures
- Gerrit van Honthorst (1592-1656) — Utrecht master of candlelit night scenes
Example works
- Mars and Cupid — Bartolomeo Manfredi
- Judith Slaying Holofernes — Artemisia Gentileschi (c. 1620)
- The Martyrdom of Saint Philip — Jusepe de Ribera (1639)
Sources
- Caravaggisti - Wikipedia encyclopedia