Guido Reni (1575-1642)

Guido Reni (4 November 1575 - 18 August 1642) was an Italian painter of high-Baroque style.

He painted primarily religious works, as well as mythological and allegorical subjects.

Active in Rome, Naples, and his native Bologna, he became the dominant figure in the Bolognese School, and his eclectic classicism was widely influential.

Reni was the most famous Italian artist of his time.

Through his pupils, he had wide-ranging influence on later Baroque.

His most distinguished pupil was Simone Cantarini, named Il Pesarese; he painted a portrait of his master, now in the Bolognese Gallery.

Reni's other Bolognese pupils included Antonio Randa (who tried to kill his master), Vincenzo Gotti, Emilio Savonanzi, Sebastiano Brunetti, Tommaso Campana, Domenico Maria Canuti, Bartolomeo Marescotti, Giovanni Maria Tamburino, and Pietro Gallinari (Pierino del Signor Guido).

Beyond Italy, Reni's influence was important in the style of many Spanish Baroque artists, such as Jusepe de Ribera and Bartolomé Esteban Murillo.

His work was greatly appreciated in France - Stendhal believed Reni must have had "a French soul" - and influenced generations of French artists such as Eustache Le Sueur, Charles Le Brun, Joseph-Marie Vien, and Jean-Baptiste Greuze.

In the 19th century, Reni's reputation declined as a result of changing taste - epitomized by John Ruskin's censorious judgment that the artist's work was sentimental and false.

A revival of interest in Reni has occurred since 1954, when an important retrospective exhibition of his work was mounted in Bologna. | © Wikipedia