Wednesday, March 20, 2019

Salvator Rosa (1615-1673) - Naples, Rome, Florence

Salvator Rosa
Two Figures, three-quarter length
before 1673
drawing
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Salvator Rosa
Two Soldiers
ca. 1656
drawing
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Salvator Rosa
Two Standing Figures Gesticulating
before 1673
drawing
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

"Born in Naples in 1615, Salvator Rosa was the son of a surveyor; it was originally intended that he pursue a scholarly career, but his native talent soon inclined him more to the art of painting, in which he seems to have been largely self-taught.  . . .  In 1635 at the age of twenty Salvator set out for Rome, not so much to complete his very fragmentary training as to satisfy his already raging ambition.  . . .  Arriving in Florence in 1640, Rosa immediately devoted himself to the satisfaction of his vigorous (though not very judicious) southern ambition.  Considering himself a genius, Rosa sought to make himself the talk of the town by any means possible.   . . .  In Florence he stood at the apex of his success; this is reflected in the fact that he was able to raise the prices for his work considerably without loss of commissions.  But despite his success in Florence and the great interest in his activities expressed by the Florentine court, Rosa felt irresistibly drawn to Rome.  At the end of 1648, after a preliminary journey to Volterra, he took his final leave from Florence and, except for a few brief trips, spent the rest of his life in Rome.  . . .  Rosa was a facile draftsman, able to capture the essential characteristics with a few strokes.  . . .  It is by no means to his discredit that, even in his later work, one detects an improvisational manner, the lingering traces of his self-training as a youth."

– Hermann Voss, from Baroque Painting in Rome (1925), revised and translated by Thomas Pelzel (San Francisco: Alan Wofsy, 1997)

attributed to Salvator Rosa
Seated and Standing Figures
before 1673
drawing
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Salvator Rosa
Standing Figure in Antique Dress
ca. 1662
drawing
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Salvator Rosa
Figure Study
ca. 1660-65
drawing
British Museum

Salvator Rosa
Falling Soldier Shouting
ca. 1650-52
drawing
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Salvator Rosa
Figure Study
ca. 1650-60
drawing
British Museum

Salvator Rosa
Figure Study
ca. 1650
drawing
British Museum

Salvator Rosa
Studies for Kneeling Old Man
ca. 1662-65
drawing
Teylers Museum, Haarlem

Salvator Rosa
Studies of Kneeling Figures
before 1673
drawing
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Salvator Rosa
Study for Kneeling Man
before 1673
drawing
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge

Salvator Rosa
Halberdier
before 1673
drawing
private collection

Salvator Rosa
Youth pulling off shirt
before 1673
drawing
Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge