The Charlatan (Italian Il Ciarlatano) is a large 1656 satirical painting by the Italian Baroque artist Bernardino Mei. It shows an aged charlatan seated on an armchair resting on a trestle stage in the Piazza del Campo, the main square of the Tuscan town of Siena.[1] He holds in his left-hand the tools of his trade; vials and remedies,[2] with pitchers and an invoice reading L'olio de filosofi di Straccione (Straccione's Philosopher's oil) lying on the cheap timbre below him. The man is hefty and dressed in old, filthy clothes -he bears a dirty white robe with a blue sash, white leggings and heavy black shoes- and an unkempt beard; Bernardino has unflatteringly portrayed him as a mixture of a second rate Old Testament prophet, tattered alchemical philosopher, and the forbidding Roman god Saturn.
The old man's simple-minded audience looks up at him with a sense of wonder and awe; one, dressed in a rose-coloured gown, is so overcome that he seems about to faint and reaches for a sniff of a remedy to regain strength. Mei has abandoned any pretence of perspective, the charlatan is several times larger than the member of his audience, and is seemingly suspended in the air, floating above the rabble below.[3] He looks out directly at the viewer, offering one of his potions in his raised right hand, with his head bowed in faux humility.
Mei utilises mostly dark tones, and although the main figure is hugely imposing to the viewer, the overall mood is sombre and melancholy. Although alchemists were still popular with the middle classes when the painting was created, they were maligned figures in the eyes of the educated.[4]
The work was popular as a print in the 18th century, however the relevance of its message was lost soon after.
Gambaccini Piero. Mountebanks and Medicasters: A History of Italian Charlatans from the Middle Ages to the Present. McFarland, 2004. ISBN0-7864-1606-8
Gentilcore, David. Medical Charlatanism in Early Modern Italy. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006.
Related Research Articles
Pietro Longhi was a Venetian painter of contemporary genre scenes of life.
The Lute Player is a composition by the Italian Baroque master Caravaggio. It used to exist in two versions, one in the Wildenstein Collection and another in the Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg. A third version, which was kept for 275 years at Badminton House, Gloucestershire, came to light in 2001, and which today is understood to be the original version. The Hermitage and the Badminton House versions were exhibited together in 2020 at the Galleria Borghese.
Sano di Pietro or Ansano di Pietro di Mencio (1405–1481) was an Italian painter of the Sienese school of painting. He was active for about half a century during the Quattrocento period and his contemporaries included Giovanni di Paolo and Sassetta.
The Kiss is an 1859 painting by the Italian artist Francesco Hayez. Possibly his best-known work, the painting conveys the main features of Italian Romanticism and has come to represent the spirit of the Risorgimento. It was commissioned by Alfonso Maria Visconti di Saliceto, who donated it to the Pinacoteca di Brera after his death.
Pietro Paolini, called il Lucchese was an Italian painter of the Baroque period. Working in Rome, Venice and finally his native Lucca, he was a follower of Caravaggio to whose work he responded in a very personal manner. He founded an Academy in his hometown, which formed the next generation of painters of Lucca.
Leonardo Fioravanti (1517–1588) was a noted doctor, surgeon and alchemist active in Italy in the 16th century.
Bernardino Varisco, was an Italian philosopher and a professor of Theoretical Philosophy at the University of Rome La Sapienza from 1905 to 1925.
Cesare Maccari was an Italian painter and sculptor, most famous for his 1888 painting Cicerone denuncia Catilina.
Self-Portrait is an oil-on-canvas painting by the Italian painter Titian. Dating to about 1560, when Titian would have been over 70 years old, it is the later of his two surviving self-portraits. It is held in the Museo del Prado, in Madrid. The painting is a realistic and unflattering depiction of the physical effects of old age, and as such shows none of the self-confidence of his earlier self-portrait now in Berlin. That painting shows Titian in three-quarter view in an alert pose.
Primavera is a large panel painting in tempera paint by the Italian Renaissance painter Sandro Botticelli made in the late 1470s or early 1480s. It has been described as "one of the most written about, and most controversial paintings in the world", and also "one of the most popular paintings in Western art".
The Italian painter and engraver Bernardino Mei worked in a Baroque manner in his native Siena and in Rome, finding patronage above all in the Chigi family.
The San Giobbe Altarpiece is a c. 1487 altarpiece in oils on panel by the Venetian Renaissance painter Giovanni Bellini. Inspired by a plague outbreak in 1485, this sacra conversazione painting is unique in that it was designed in situ with the surrounding architecture of the church, and was one of the largest sacra conversazione paintings at the time. Although it was originally located in the Church of San Giobbe, Venice, it is now in the Gallerie dell'Accademia in Venice after having been stolen by Napoleon Bonaparte.
The Portrait of a Gentleman in a Fur is an oil painting by the Italian Renaissance painter Paolo Veronese measuring 140 centimetres (55 in) by 107 centimetres (42 in), dated to c. 1550–1560 and now in the Galleria Palatina in Florence. Another version exists at the Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest. The painting's subject is unknown: Daniele Barbaro has been suggested, but this is contradicted by a confirmed portrait of him held at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam.
The Baptism of the Eunuch is a 1626 painting by the Dutch artist Rembrandt van Rijn, owned by the Museum Catharijneconvent in Utrecht since 1976. It shows Philip the Evangelist baptising an Ethiopian man, a eunuch, on the road from Jerusalem to Gaza, traditionally marking the start of the Ethiopian Church.
David Gentilcore is Professor of Modern History at the Ca' Foscari University of Venice, with particular interests in the history of popular religion, the history of medicine and health, and the history of food and diet. His Medical Charlatanism in Early Modern Italy was awarded the Royal Society of Canada's "Dr Jason A. Hannah medal" in 2008 and in 2012 he was awarded the "Salvatore De Renzi International Prize" for his contribution to the history of medicine, by the University of Salerno medical school and the Ordine dei Medici of Salerno. He has held visiting professorships at McMaster University (Canada) and Villa I Tatti, Florence, and visiting fellowships at IMéRA - Institute for Advanced Study, Aix-Marseille University (France) and the School of Advanced Study, University of London. He has been the recipient of research grants from the European Research Council, the European Institutes for Advanced Study Fellowship Programme, the Economic and Social Research Council, the Wellcome Trust, the Leverhulme Trust, and the Arts and Humanities Research Board. He is the son of historical geographer Rocco Louis Gentilcore.
Baptism of Christ is a tempera painting on panel by the Italian Renaissance master Giovanni Bellini, dating to 1500–1502, and now located in the Chiesa di Santa Corona in Vicenza. It is signed IOANNES / BELLINVS on a rock in the lower left.
The Knight in Black is an oil on canvas portrait painting of an unknown male subject by Giovanni Battista Moroni, from c. 1567. It is held in the Museo Poldi Pezzoli, in Milan.
The contrade of Legnano are the eight historical subdivisions into which the city of Legnano, in Lombardy, in Italy, is divided. They participate annually in the Palio di Legnano.
Saint Anthony Preaching to the Fish is a 1580–1585 oil-on-canvas painting of Anthony of Padua by Paolo Veronese, now in the Galleria Borghese in Rome. Its original location is unknown, though its medium dimensions of 104 centimetres (41 in) by 150 centimetres (59 in) mean it may have been painted for the side wall of a chapel or as part of a cycle of paintings for a small school (scuola) somewhere in Veneto. It entered the collection of Cardinal Scipione Borghese as a 1607 gift from Francesco Barbaro.
Saint John the Baptist Preaching is a 1562 oil-on-canvas painting of John the Baptist by Paolo Veronese, now in the Galleria Borghese in Rome. The painting depicts John the Baptist acting primarily and quite literally as a messenger for the coming of Jesus.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
