Scarsellino

Scarsellino or Ippolito Scarsella (1550 (or 1551) – 28 October 1620) was an Italian mid-to-late sixteenth century reformist painter and one of the most important representatives of the School of Ferrara. His landscapes of both sacred and secular themes strongly anticipate the landscape painting traditions of the 17th century.

Life

Ippolito Scarsella was born and died in Ferrara. His father was the lesser-known painter Sigismondo Scarsella, who was particularly skilled as an architect. Scarsellino traveled and worked extensively across Italy, encountering many influences.

He lived in Venice for four years around 1570. The exact date is not known. He reportedly trained in Venice in the studio of Veronese. Scarsellino worked alongside the brothers Carracci in the Palazzo dei Diamanti in Ferrara. As can be observed from their works, the Ferrarese artist and the Bolognese painters exhibited a reciprocal influence upon one another. To name just one of many examples, Ludovico Carracci's 1616 Martyrdom of Saint Margaret for the Church of San Maurizio in Mantua takes its inspiration from Scarsellino's painting of the same subject, executed five years prior for the Oratory of Saint Margaret in Ferrara.

One of Scarsellino's most important pupils was Costanzo Cattani.

Work Scarsellino was an easel painter as well as a fresco artist. Landscape with Abraham and Isaac (Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge) Apollo (MFA, San Francisco) Madonna with Saints (c1600; MFA, Houston) Adoration of the Magi (c1600, Capitoline Museums, Rome) Allegorical Scene (Pinacoteca Nazionale, Ferrara) Saint Demetrius (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston) Virgin and Angels Imploring Christ not to Punish Lust, Avarice, and Pride (Pinacoteca, Vatican) Judgment of Paris (Uffizi Gallery, Florence)