Biagio Manzoni

Biagio Manzoni’s life remained shrouded in mystery for a quite some time. Long mistaken for a certain Michele who died prematurely in 1666, Biagio made a decidedly Caravaggesque mark on the art of Romagna. Recent research ¹ has brought to light the painter’s baptism certificate, which was discovered in the Archivio Capitolare in Faenza and is dated 1 May 1595, and ascertained his presence in Rome between 1614 and 1617, thus confiming earlier conjecture that he had first-hand experience of the city’s artistic circles in the 1610s and
‘20s.

Two other documents also mention the artist. The first, dated 1630, refers to payment for a painting, while the second can be dated to 1648 ² . These documents provide us with the only certain information we have concerning his work in the city. The handful of paintings that can definitely be attributed to him include The Martyrdom of St. Eutropius in the Pinacoteca Comunale di Faenza and The Martyrdom of St. Sebasatian now in the Louvre in Paris, while the attribution to him of the Incredulity of St. Thomas in the church of the Capuchin Friars in
Faenza is still open to question. Biagio Manzoni’s artistic personality was first studied by Luigi Lanzi in 1795–6 and subsequently explored in considerable depth by both Roberto Longhi in 1957 and Francesco Arcangeli in 1959,
the latter two scholars dubbing his style that of a “peripheral follower of Caravaggio”.

1. Andrea Bertozzi, Nuove evidenze documentarie per Biagio Manzoni, caravaggesco faentino, in “Paragone”, n. 113, 2014, pp. 57-62[↩]
2. in D. Benati, in Guido Cagnacci: protagonista del Seicento tra Caravaggio e Reni, exhibition catalogue, ed. D. Benati and A. Paolucci, Forlì, Musei di San Domenico, 20 January – 22 June, Cinisello Balsamo 2008, pp. 268-269, n. 63[↩]