Francesco Fracanzano

(Monopoli, 1612 - Napoli, 1656)

Attributed to

Oil painting on canvas depicting Saint Francis of Paola in prayer.
Work without frame.

"The canvas can be attributed to the painter who worked in Naples in the seventeenth century, Francesco Fracanzano (Monopoli, 9 July 1612 - Naples, 1656) and represents San Francesco di Paola in prayer, with the typical iconographic attributes of the saint consisting of the habit, the book (which partially reads "Charitas" ) with a skull above it, placed below and to the side of the figure.The painting has the typical characteristics attributable to Fracanzano such as the full and lumpy material density, the color of the skin and of the hands which veers towards a reddish, which highlights a naturalism of Caravaggesque matrix which in part adopts the teachings of the Ribera school but to which it adds the tonal and drawing values of Guercino, the Carracci as well as Reni himself.The work can be ascribed to the period of pictorial experience of Fracanzano more contiguous to the example Pio del Ribera. A very similar work is exhibited at the Museum of Dubrovinik (Croatia), with some differences (shown in parallel in this sheet with the use of the image for comparison) concerning the position of the book, placed vertically and with the pages unfolded, the skull in the background, the composition that seems to have become more lumpy by now, accentuating the currant structure, the kneeling figure of the saint is seen in full. For the work taken for comparison, entirely attributable to the same author, for a purely philological need, we report a detailed study which has highlighted that "the second half of the seventeenth century refers to the San Francesco di Paola of Dubrovnik, where the reprise of the riberesque characters in the face subsides in the drafting of the soft and wide folds of the habit, which cover the entire composition and allow for this combination a valid comparison both with works by Francesco Fracanzano, such as with the San Benedetto of San Gregorio Armeno and the hermit Saint Paul of the church of Sant'Onofrio dei Vecchi in Naples, both with the mature production of Angelo Solimena and with the youthful one of his son Francesco, above all with regard to the revival of the ways of Lanfranco" (On the traces of Neapolitan painting in Croatia between the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries by Mario Alberto Pavone - University of Palermo). But it should be emphasized that many works referring to figures of Saints, passed from the antiques market and contained in private and museum collections, created by Francesco Fracanzano, present an identical expressive approach and analogous pictorial and compositional qualities, this confirming the validity of the attribution to the same painter. The painting retains the original seventeenth-century frame; a very old re-lining from the mid-nineteenth century has been maintained which, being in good condition, has not been replaced (nor raised for other purposes)."

Yes thanks Francesco Amato for the authoritative opinion.