Jusepe de Ribera: 8 works

'This work is a superb monumental painting by Jusepe de Ribera, a Spanish born artist who spent his entire career in Italy. Ribera was one of the most important figures in European painting in the seventeenth century and one of the major artists of the Counter-Reformation.'

'This caricature-like representation displays Ribera's usual strain of irony and frequent combination of figures of differing scale. The striking crimson ink underscores the outlandish qualities of Ribera's subject matter.'

'Here the influence of Caravaggio----the stark placement of the intensely lit figure against a dark background, the unrelenting naturalism, and the strength of characterization----is tempered by a classicism that reveals Ribera's study of the Renaissance masters and contemporary Bolognese painters.'

'Rather than portraying the subject as a refined and noble figure, Ribera depicted him as an individual tried by a life of hardship, imbued with the force of a living personality.'

'The Spanish painter Jusepe de Ribera, known as Spagnoletto, long worked in Naples for the viceroy, nobility, churches and monasteries in the city.'

'This is an extraordinary work demonstrating the excellent art of 'Lo Spagnoletto'.'

'"As N. Turner has orally affirmed, this unpublished drawing can be attributed to Jusepe de Ribera, a Spanish painter who has mostly lived and worked in Italy and particularly in Naples." (C. Garofalo, DiSegno Antico 2000).'

'In the 17th century, Spanish painting experienced a remarkable development that is still referred to as the "golden age" and illustrated by names like Zurbarán, Vélasquez, Murillo and Ribera. Native to the region of Valencia, Jusepe de Ribera (1591--1652) studied under the Spanish painter Ribalta.'