Scuola Genovese del XVII secolo, Morte di Abe... Lot n° 104

The early 17th-century Genoese painting experience is closely linked to the presence in the city of two key figures of the Italian and European Baroque: Peter Paul Rubens and Antoon Van Dyck. Rubens resided in the city between 1604 and 1608, arriving directly from Rome; he thus brought with him the lessons learned from the two "fathers" of Roman Baroque, Caravaggio and Annibale Carracci. His pupil, Van Dyck, was to be one of the most celebrated and disputed portrait painters of his time. The bearing of the painting of these two artists in this painting is particularly evidenced in the fast and very expressive brushwork of which the bodies are made up; the emotionality conveyed through the stroke is well suited to depict the drama of the event: Adam and Eve discover the body of their dead son Abel, killed by his brother Cain. The bloodless body lies on a boulder: its pose is almost reminiscent of Salvator Rosa's Prometheus at the Corsini Gallery; the colors are almost globally dark, smoky, except for the touches of light-almost violent-constituted by the protagonists' nudes. Oil on canvas, cm est. 109x126, int. 102x108