Giuseppe Maria Crespi Biography
Giuseppe Maria Crespi known as lo Spagnolo or lo Spagnoletto (Bologna, 14 March 1665 – Bologna, 16 July 1747) was an Italian painter. Italian painter of the Bolognese school, nicknamed "lo Spagnolo" or "lo Spagnoletto" from a very young age for his habit of wearing tight, Spanish-style clothes. He received his first training with the painter AM Toni and then moved on to the school of Canuti and, later, attended the Nude Academy of Cignani's atelier. Then, financed by the rich Bolognese patron Giovanni Ricci, he completed the second part of his training by studying, around northern Italy, the great works of the Emilian school of the late Renaissance (Correggio, Federico Barocci) and coming into contact with Venetian coloristics which it will particularly affect him. A very versatile painter in the choice of episodes represented, he explores all of painting, from sacred to genre painting up to portraiture, creating original works, fully recovering some elements of popular naturalism. Between 1700 and 1705 Crespi worked for Eugene of Savoy, for whom he executed Achilles taught by Chiron and Aeneas and the Sibyl and Charon in Vienna. Prince Ferdinando de' Medici later became his patron, for whom he executed some of his best works including Fiera di Poggio a Caiano, Massacre of the Innocents (Uffizi) and an Ecstasy of Saint Margaret (Diocesan Museum of Cortona). He actively collaborates with the Accademia Clementina in Bologna and will later receive a commission from an English merchant, for whom he performs a cycle dealing with the life of an opera singer, which has not survived to us, except for the Flea Finder, where he clearly sees the poverty and anti-heroicism of the episode and the character as seen in previous works. A debasement of the character and a representation of poverty which in this period will be carried forward by various artists throughout Europe, such as Giacomo Ceruti or William Hogarth. He received a knighthood from Pope Benedict XIV in 1740, in 1745 he lost his sight without being able to paint anymore and died in 1747.
