GARZI, Luigi

(b. 1638 Pistoia, d. 1721 Roma)

Italian painter. At the age of 15 he entered the Roman workshop of Andrea Sacchi, from whom he acquired the classical training that served him throughout his career. Among his earliest works is the Triumph of St Catherine and All Saints (Rome, Santa Caterina a Magnanapoli), which clearly shows the influence of Emilian painting, particularly that of Reni. Another early canvas is St Silvestro Shows Constantine Portraits of SS Peter and Paul (Rome, Santa Croce in Gerusalemme).

In 1680 Garzi was appointed Regent of the Congregazione dei Virtuosi al Pantheon, and in 1682 he became Principe of the Accademia di San Luca, of which he had been a member since 1670. In the early 1680s he contributed to the frescoed decoration of the vault of San Carlo al Corso, where his works included an Allegory of Faith. This was influenced by Giovanni Lanfranco’s decoration in Sant’Andrea della Valle, as was his fresco depicting the Glory of the Eternal Father (1686; Santa Maria del Popolo, Cappella Cybo).

Garzi painted easel pictures, but he is best known for his monumental works. His fresco decorations can be seen in a number of churches in Rome and Naples. While always retaining his commitment to classicism, Garzi modified his style throughout his career in response to the prominent masters of the day, reflecting the influence of Luca Giordano and Francesco Solimena in about 1697 and his awareness of Carlo Maratti’s late Baroque manner in the early 1710s.

Allegory of Autumn

This painting is the result of a collaboration between a figure painter influenced by Carlo Maratti and a northern European still-life painter in the circle of Abraham Brueghel. The figures, painted prior to the still-life, are attributed to Luigi Garzi, while the voluptuous still-life of fruits and flowers to Franz Werner von Tamm, who was in Rome from 1685 and remained in Italy until 1701.

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Alpheus and Arethusa

The subject is taken from Ovid, Metamorphoses (5:572-641.) Arethusa was bathing on a river when she met Alpheus. She felt something stirring in the depths beneath her so she hurriedly get out of the water. She fled away from the stream but was chased by Alpheus. Worn out, Arethusa called on the her goddess, Artemis. Artemis turned her into a spring of water. But still, she was not free from Alpheus, changing back into a river, he went into the tunnel that Arethusa went into and now his water is intermingled with the water from Arethusa’s fountain. It is said that if you throw something into the Alpheus in Greece, it will turn up into Arethusa’s well in Sicily.

In the present composition we see Diana reaching down to envelop Arethusa in a cloud, just as the nymph’s strength is beginning to fail her, and transform her into a stream which runs underground.

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Holy Family with Angels in a Landscape

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