Miracle of Domenico Segni
1650
17th century
21.1 cm x 36.3 cm (8 5/16 in. x 14 5/16 in.)
Pier Francesco Mola
(Coldrerio (Canton Ticino) Switzerland, 1612 - 1666, Rome)
Primary
Object Type:
drawing
Artist Nationality:
Europe, Italian
Medium and Support:
Pen and brown ink with brush and brown wash over black chalk on beige antique...
Credit Line:
Blanton Museum of Art, The University of Texas at Austin, The Suida-Manning Collection, 2017
Accession Number:
2017.1238
Against the rising tide of academic classicism in mid-century Rome, Mola maintained a warm, inherently expressive naturalism founded on the example of Annibale Carracci and Guercino, invigorated by his extended stay in Venice, and featuring the depiction of landscape. This is a study for one of three local mira-cles of the Virgin in the cloister of Santa Maria della Quercia at Viterbo, Mola’s first and most important landscapes in fresco. Characteristic of Mola’s drafts-manship are the approximative description, rich and variable tonality, and animated surface, all the result of an exceptionally dense and loose application of washes.