Holy Family with Saints Joachim and Elizabeth

Very few works are known by Bernardi, whose biography is also rather obscure. He was among the earliest adherents of Caravaggism in Verona and this altarpiece attests to the sincerity of his naturalism. The subject is given an everyday setting, the workshop of a carpenter whose tools are arranged in the foreground. The light strikes the figures sharply from the upper right, casting in darkness the background space and the almost imperceptible opening in the upper left corner.