Seicento

The Seicento - Italian for 'six hundred', short for milleseicento, '1600' - is the name given to Italian history and culture during the seventeenth century. In art it marks the end of the Renaissance and the flourishing of the Counter-Reformation Baroque: the century of Caravaggio's tenebrism, the Carracci reform of painting, Bernini's theatrical sculpture and architecture, and the illusionistic ceiling painting of Pietro da Cortona. Regional schools gave the century its range, from Bolognese classicism to the dark drama of Neapolitan painting and the colorism of Venice. The Seicento mattered because it produced the visual language of Catholic renewal - art engineered for emotional impact - and left Italy's churches, palaces, and public spaces in essentially their Baroque form to this day.

Defining characteristics

• Tenebrist lighting: deep shadow broken by directed, dramatic light
• Illusionistic ceiling painting (quadratura) opening rooms into painted sky
• Dynamic diagonal compositions caught in mid-action
• Emotional intensity and theatrical gesture in figures
• Rich, saturated color alongside earthy naturalism
• Grand decorative schemes fusing painting, stucco, and architecture

Key figures

• Caravaggio (1571-1610) — Master of tenebrism whose dramatic naturalism reshaped Seicento painting
• Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680) — Sculptor and architect who fused media into Baroque theater
• Annibale Carracci (1560-1609) — Reformer of painting who revived classical form in the Farnese ceiling
• Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-c. 1656) — Caravaggisti painter of forceful biblical and mythological scenes

Example works

• The Calling of Saint Matthew — Caravaggio (1599-1600)
• The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa — Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1652)
• Judith Slaying Holofernes — Artemisia Gentileschi (c. 1612-1613)

Sources

• Seicento - Wikipedia encyclopedia
• Italian Baroque - Wikipedia encyclopedia

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