In the Cabinet: «Lascivie e santità» Printed works by the Carraccis

Together with their cousin Ludovico Carracci, the brothers Agostino (1557-1602) and Annibale Carracci (1560-1609) were among the founders of baroque painting. Agostino particularly played a significant role in the field of printing. He became famous for his reproductions of the leading masters of the north Italian Renaissance, principally Correggio, Veronese, Tintoretto and Titian. Thanks to the technical innovation of the varying thickness of line, he was successful in converting the chromatic quality of north Italian painting into copperplate engravings. Later Agostino worked mainly from his own designs. With Lascivie, a loose series of in some cases very explicit erotic scenes in the guise of scenes from mythology, he provoked the anger of Pope Clemens VIII. Much more meagre, but of a very high quality is the printed oeuvre of his brother Annibale, where we also find some quite abandoned mythological scenes in addition to depictions of religious themes.