Aniello Falcone

Born in Naples to a tradesman, he showed his artistic tendency at an early age. He first received some instruction from a relative, before becoming a pupil of Jusepe de Ribera. Bernardo de' Dominici records a journey to Rome, and Falcone's early works include genre paintings influenced by artists working in Rome, such as Pieter van Laer and Michelangelo Cerquozzi, and, equally importantly, by works painted by Diego Velázquez in Italy (1629–30); it was perhaps through Falcone that the painting of bambocciate (low-life scenes) spread to Naples. His early Schoolmistress (New York, Wildenstein's) is a harshly naturalistic work with strong contrasts of light and dark. The theme of St. Lucy Distributing Alms (Naples, Museo di Capodimonte) is religious, yet Falcone painted a scene from everyday life. The saint and her companions give alms to tattered, disabled beggars in a Neapolitan street, and the group is portrayed with a warmth and dignity reminiscent of Velázquez and Louis Le Nain. Falcone also painted in fresco and received several official commissions. In the frescoes in the chapel of St. Agatha in San Paolo Maggiore, Naples and in the signed Rest on the Flight into Egypt (1641; Naples Cathedral) Falcone began to move towards an academic style influenced by Romano-Bolognese classicism, developing it further in frescoed scenes from the Life of St. Ignatius in the sacristy of the Gesù Nuovo in Naples. In these pictures, and in the battle scenes of the 1640s, Falcone's handling became more painterly, and his richer colour and warmer light suggest a response to Nicolas Poussin and to Giovanni Benedetto Castiglione.

Falcone won international renown as a specialist in battle scenes, their subjects taken from both biblical and secular history, and was nicknamed L'Oracolo delle Battaglie. His works attracted the attention of the Flemish dealer and collector Gaspar Roomer, who sold his work across Europe, and he was one of the artists commissioned by Philip IV of Spain to paint a series of scenes from ancient Roman history for the Buen Retiro palace. Falcone created the ‘battle scene without a hero’ (Saxl): he showed the battle as a brutal, confused struggle between anonymous troops, without heroes, without defeats and without particular historical incidents. The Battle between Turks and Christians (1621; Paris, Louvre) is one of the earliest. The frieze-like composition is elaborately structured, yet the picture is rich in intensely naturalistic, vividly coloured details of armour and weapons and precisely observed expressions of anger and pain.

During the insurrection against Spanish rule led by Masaniello in 1647, he resolved to be bloodily avenged for the death, at the hands of two Spaniards, of a nephew and of a pupil in the school of art which he had established in Naples. He joined Salvator Rosa, Carlo Coppola, and others in an armed band called the Compagnia della Morte ("Company of Death"). When the revolt was crushed, Falcone and Rosa made off to Rome, where Borgognone noticed the works of Falcone, and became his friend, and a Frenchman induced him to go to France, where Louis XIV became one of his patrons. Ultimately, Jean-Baptiste Colbert obtained permission for the painter to return to Naples, where he died during the plague of 1656. His pupils included Salvator Rosa and Carlo Coppola, Domenico Gargiulo (known as Micco Spadaro), Paolo Porpora and Andrea di Leone.

Saxl, F. (1939–40). "The Battle Scene without a Hero: Aniello Falcone and his Patrons". Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes. 3 (1/2): 70–87. doi:10.2307/750193. JSTOR 750193. Pierluigi Leone De Castris, Aniello Falcone, Artem editor, 2025 Pierluigi Leone De Castris, Aniello Falcone, the Velàzquez of Naples, Elio de Rosa editor, 2022