DOMENICHINO
(b. 1581, Bologna, d. 1641, Napoli)

Adam and Eve

1623-25
Oil on canvas
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Grenoble

Domenichino was perhaps the most sophisticated painter of the seventeenth century, so much so, in fact, that at times his work can seem rarefied. He also played an important cultural role with regard to the theory of art. He studied under the Carracci cousins, first in Bologna and then in Rome (where at the beginning of the century he assisted Annibale who was then working in the Farnese Gallery and on the large lunettes in Palazzo Doria Pamphilj).

Domenichino was completely bowled over by the simple, classical, and elegant beauty of Raphael's art, having a deep admiration for all the great masters of the early sixteenth century. His career was mainly spent trying to revive that wonderful era of the High Renaissance, but he did this with a completely up-to-date critical and intellectual approach.