Bolognese painter
Head of an Elderly Woman, 1580/1585 ca.
oil on paper; inv. P 91
acquisition: museum purchase; 1993
This piece is a rare example of panting from life in late 16th century Bologna following the Carraccis teaching method.
This is not an actual portrait, since it does not include all of the formal elements of portraiture of the time, which would have depicted the subject’s social status (through her clothing, facial features, gestures - see Benedetto Gennari’s Portrait of a Woman no. 15).
Those elements are barely sketched, or not even considered at all in this small-scale framing.
Instead, the artist has focused on an objective, but not dispassionate investigation of a face marked by age, by carefully noting the key features, avoiding an excessively detailed description thereby achieving an effect of great immediacy.
Since the initial attribution to Ludovico Carracci, as the painting was entered into the Municipal Art Collection, certain criticisms have shifted the work to a wider time span , going from late 16th century Bologna up to the early experiences of the Carraccis.
