Enea Salmeggia – painter

Bergamo artist left treasure trove of pictures to remember him by

Enea Salmeggia's Il Martirio di Sant'Alessandro
hangs behind the altar of Sant'Alessandro in Colonna

Enea Salmeggia, who was active during the late Renaissance period and left behind a rich legacy of paintings in Lombardy, died on 25 February 1626 in Bergamo.

Salmeggia, also known as Il Talpino, or Salmezza, spent time in Rome as a young man, where he studied the works of Raphael. His style has often been likened to that of Raphael and he has even been dubbed the ‘Bergamo Raphael’ by some art enthusiasts. A drawing in the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, of two figures seated along with some architectural studies, was previously attributed to Raphael, but has now been ascribed to Enea Salmeggia.

The artist was born at Salmezza, a frazione of Nembro, a comune in the province of Bergamo, between 1565 and 1570. It is known that Salmeggia grew up in Borgo San Leonardo in Bergamo, where his father, Antonio, was a tailor.

He learnt the art of painting from other Bergamo painters and is also believed to have studied under the Bergamo artist Simone Peterzano in Milan. Caravaggio was one of Peterzano’s most famous pupils and it has been suggested that Salmeggia could have been studying with Peterzano at about the same time as Caravaggio.

Salmeggia's Portrait of a Gentleman
can be seen at Accademia Carrara

Salmeggia was so young when he received his first commission to paint an Adoration of the Magi for the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Bergamo that his father had to sign the acceptance document on his behalf.

The artist married Vittoria Daverio, the sister of Milanese sculptor Pietro Antonio Daverio, and they had six children. Two of their children died from the plague and one went into a monastery, but his daughters, Chiara and Elisabetta, and his son, Francesco, helped in his workshop near the Church of Sant’Alessandro in Colonna in Via Sant’Alessandro, and they later became painters themselves.

One of Salmeggia’s most famous works, Il Martirio di Sant’Alessandro, an oil on canvas, completed in 1623, can still be seen behind the altar in the Church of Sant’Alessandro in Colonna.

The Church has a Roman column in front of it, which is believed to mark the exact spot where Bergamo’s patron saint, Sant’Alessandro was martyred by the Romans in 303 for refusing to renounce his Christian faith. Every year, on 26 August, the Festa di Sant’Alessandro, Bergamo people commemorates Sant’Alessandro’s decapitation there.

After Salmeggia died in Bergamo in 1626 he was buried in the Church of Sant’Alessandro in Colonna.

There are paintings by Salmeggia in the churches of Sant’Andrea and Santi Bartolomeo e Stefano in Bergamo and the Accademia Carrara, a prestigious art gallery in Bergamo, also has works by Salmeggia, including his Portrait of a Gentleman. Further afield, there are paintings by Salmeggia in Brescia, Lodi and Milan.

In Nembro, the suburb where Salmeggia was born, the Church of San Martino has no fewer than 27 of his paintings for visitors to admire.

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A Renaissance painter who worked in Bergamo

Talented artist from Brescia acclaimed for sacred paintings and portraits

Bonvicino - known as Il Moretto - was born
in Brescia but also worked in Bergamo

Alessandro Bonvicino, who died on 22 December, 1554, was an acclaimed Renaissance painter largely associated with the city of Brescia, yet he is known to have worked in Bergamo.

Nicknamed Il Moretto da Brescia - the little moor from Brescia - Bonvicino collaborated with the Venetian artist Lorenzo Lotto in Bergamo and was commissioned by a number of churches and religious organisations in the city and province.

The portrait painter Giovanni Battista Moroni from Albino, in the province of Bergamo, was one of his pupils.

Bonvicino, sometimes known as Buonvicino, was born in Rovato, a town in the province of Brescia, about 40km (25 miles) southeast of Bergamo, in about 1498. It is not known how he acquired his nickname of Il Moretto.

He studied painting under Floriano Ferramola, but is also believed to have trained with Vincenzo Foppa, a painter who was active in Brescia in the early years of the 16th century. 

It is believed he may also have been an apprentice to Titian in Venice and it is known that he modelled his portrait painting on the Venetian style. Bonvicino is believed to have admired Raphael, although there is no evidence he ever travelled to Rome. He specialized in painting altarpieces in oils rather than in fresco.

Il Moretto's Madonna and Child Enthroned
with Saints at the Chiesa di Sant'Andrea

At the height of his career, Bonvicino was considered one of the most acclaimed painters working in Brescia. In 1521 he worked with Girolamo Romanino in the Duomo Vecchio of Brescia, executing a Last Supper, Elijah in the Desert and a Fall of Manna and he later worked with Lorenzo Lotto in the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Bergamo.

Elsewhere in Bergamo, the Chiesa di Sant’Alessandro in Colonna in Via Sant'Alessandro in the Città Bassa has a Virgin adoring the Child by Bonvicino, while there is a Madonna and Child Enthroned with Saints in the Chiesa di Sant'Andrea in Via Porta Dipinta in the Città Alta. 

 

Bonvicino's paintings can be found in many other churches in Brescia,  Milan and Verona and in the collections of the National Gallery in London, the Metropolitan Museum in New York and the Hermitage in St Petersburg, as well as galleries in Milan, Venice, Paris, Vienna, Frankfurt, Oxford, Washington and Budapest, and the Accademia Carrara in Bergamo.

Bonvicino’s 1526 Portrait of a Man, which now hangs in the National Gallery, is said to be the earliest Italian full-length portrait. The setting for his subject, who is leaning on a classical column, was later to be emulated by Moroni.

Noted for his piety, Bonvicino prayed and fasted before embarking on any sacred work of art, such as painting the Virgin Mother. He spent most of his life in Brescia and belonged to two of the religious confraternities there. He died, aged about 56, in Brescia.

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