Francesco Albani or Albano (17 March or 17 August 1578 – 4 October 1660) was an Italian Baroque painter of Albanian origin who was active in Bologna (1591–1600; 1609; 1610; 1618–1622), Rome (1600–1609; 1610–1617; 1623–1625), Viterbo (1609–1610), Mantua (1621–1622) and Florence (1633).
In 1600, Albani moved to Rome to work on the fresco decoration of the gallery of the Palazzo Farnese, which was being completed by the studio of Annibale Carracci. At this time, Rome, under Clement VIIIAldobrandini (1592–1605) was exhibiting some degree of administrative stability and renewed artistic patronage. While Pope Clement had been born into a Florentine family resident in Urbino, his family was allied by marriage to the Emilia-Romagna and the Farnese, since Ranuccio I Farnese, Duke of Parma had married Margherita Aldobrandini. Parma, like Bologna, being part of the Region of Emilia-Romagna, it was not surprising that Cardinal Odoardo Farnese, Ranuccio's brother, chose to patronise the Carraccis from Bologna, thereby establishing Bolognese dominance of Roman fresco painting for nearly two decades.
Albani became one of Annibale's most prominent apprentices. Using Annibale's designs and assisted by Lanfranco and Sisto Badalocchio, Albani completed frescoes for the San Diego Chapel in San Giacomo degli Spagnoli between 1602 and 1607. In 1606–7, Albani completed the frescoes in the Palazzo Mattei di Giove in Rome. He later completed two other frescoes in the same palace, also on the theme of Life of Joseph.
In his later years, Albani developed a mutual, though respectful, rivalry with the more successful Guido Reni, who was also heavily patronized by the Aldobrandini, and under whom Albani had worked at the chapel of the Palazzo del Quirinale.
Albani's best frescoes are those on mythological subjects. Among the best of his sacred subjects are a St Sebastian and an Assumption of the Virgin, both in the church of San Sebastiano fuori le Mura in Rome. He was among the Italian painters to devote himself to painting cabinet pictures.[2] His mythological subjects include The Sleeping Venus, Diana in the Bath, Danaë Reclining, Galatea on the Sea, and Europa on the Bull. A rare etching, the Death of Dido, is attributed to him. Carlo Cignani, Andrea Sacchi, Francesco Mola, and Giovanni Francesco Grimaldi were among his students.[citation needed] Following the death of his wife he returned to Bologna, where he married a second time and lived until his death.[2]
Legacy
Albani never acquired the monumentality or tenebrism that was quaking the contemporary world of painters, and is often derided for his lyric, cherubim-filled sweetness, which often has not yet shaken the mannerist elegance. While Albani's thematic would have appealed to Poussin, he lacked the Frenchman's muscular drama. His style sometimes seems to have more in common with the decorative Rococo than with the painting of his own time.
.jpg)
