1563 -1639 · Tuscany, Rome, Genoa, Paris and London

Caravaggesque light, precious fabrics and meditative softness make Orazio Gentileschi one of the most refined painters of the first European Baroque.

Orazio Gentileschi was born in Pisa in 1563 and died in London in 1639. Installed young in Rome, he first worked in the Mannerist environment before the meeting with Caravaggio profoundly transformed his painting. He adopts directed light, models taken from reality and the proximity of bodies, but develops a clearer, slower and more precious way. In The Annunciation, the dialogue between the Virgin and the angel is constructed through light, draperies and the measured distance of figures. The Holy Families and the Rest during the flight into Egypt favor simple gestures: the Child's sleep, maternal protection, fatigue of travel and silence of the landscape. The truth human never diminishes sacred dignity. After Rome, Gentileschi worked in the Marches, in Genoa, in Paris for Marie de Medici then in London at the court of Charles I. This international career further refines his palette and his taste for silks, cold blues and luminous skin tones. Father of Artemisia Gentileschi, he is also a major figure in Caravaggio beyond Rome. The selection "Orazio Gentileschi" notably compares The Annunciation and The Holy Family with the child Saint John the Baptist. His reading favors the material.

Gentileschi transforms chiaroscuro into silence: the light slides over a fabric, brings the figures together and gives the sacred story an almost tactile softness.