PROCACCINI, Carlo Antonio

Italian painter, son of Ercole Procaccini. The oeuvre attributed to him comprises only a few small oil paintings, and practically nothing is known of his life. The frescoes that were documented in the cloister of the Franciscan monastery of San Angelo in Milan have been destroyed. There is documentary evidence that he was paid for his part in a cycle of scenes from the Life of St Carlo Borromeo in 1604; sources also mention a Virgin with Sts Agatha, Peter and John, signed and dated 1605.

In his lifetime he must have been well known as a painter of still-lifes and landscapes, his still-life paintings were popular in the Spanish court. Only two small landscapes are known: they were published by Longhi (1965) and are of central importance to the reconstruction of Carlantonio’s oeuvre. Both signed and dated 1616, one is entitled Christ Healing the Blind Man and the other Mercury and the Daughter of Cecrops (both private collection). They are exceptionally similar both in the composition and in the spatial arrangement of the building elements. Both are sketchily drawn landscapes that differ mainly in the small figures, which have been added as accessories to indicate the theme of the picture. His landscapes are in a style midway between Mannerism and Baroque, like those of Paul Bril and Adam Elmsheimer, by whom he seems to have been influenced. His paintings were greatly in demand by contemporaries.