Giovanni Battista Salvi da Sassoferrato, known as Il Sassoferrato
(Sassoferrato, 1609 – Rome, 1685)
Annunciation
1640-1645
Oil on canvas
171,5×119 cm
Poldi Pezzoli Museum, Milan
ARTWORK
This painting is a copy of a famous altarpiece, now in the Pinacoteca Vaticana, painted by Federico Barocci (Urbino 1535-1612) between 1582 and 1584 for the Della Rovere chapel in the Holy House of Loreto. In the centre of the domestic scene is an open window through which we see the turrets and façade of the Ducal Palace of Urbino, home of Francesco Maria II della Rovere (1549-1631), who commissioned Barocci’s painting.
The original lacks the cat which appears in Giovanni Battista Salvi’s work, a little ungraceful and monkey-like, curled up in a corner in the foreground.
The two figures, Mary and the archangel Gabriel, are depicted with great simplicity. They are bathed in a diffused light, and the whole scene has a peaceful, domestic feel. Mary’s face, smooth and bright like porcelain, particularly stands out.
The Virgin, who had been reading, looks down and leans back slightly, away from the announcement, while the angel stretches one hand toward her, holding a lily, a symbol of purity, in the other.
BIOGRAPHY
Giovanni Battista Salvi was known as ‘Il Sassoferrato’, after the Marche village where he was born on 25 August 1609.
He trained there with his father, a painter and owner of a majolica factory, which might explain the polished, enamel-like colours typical of his paintings.
In 1628 he went to join the workshop of Domenichino in Rome, but was also influenced by Guido Reni and, in particular, artists of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries such as Perugino and Raphael. These painters not only inspired Salvi’s style and composition (often repeated in various versions), but also the facial features of the holy figures.
He frequently returned from Rome to the Marche, and also worked in Perugia. His extensive production included some excellent portraits alongside his religious works. He died in Rome in 1685.
