Painting "st. Francisco In Prayer" - Ercole Gennari

ERCOLE GENNARI (Cento, 1597 – Bologna, 1658)
The painting portrays Saint Francis in meditation with the Crucifix set against a neutral background. The expressiveness of the Saint is effective, the pensive, wrinkled face resting melancholically on the palm of his right hand, the emaciated face, the sunken eyes, the short hair and beard, dressed in a simple habit and with a meditative gaze turned towards the Crucifix.
The full-bodied and balanced pictorial material in the almost monochrome color accords, manifests the technical characteristics corresponding to the painters of figurative culture from Bologna and Ferrara active in the first decades of the 17th century. The painting we propose is credibly the work of Ercole Gennari, brother-in-law and precious collaborator of Bottega del Guercino, who painted it under the aegis of the same Master who executed the preparatory drawing and intervened by retouching the work, in order to achieve a good final result of the work.
The painting is described by Prof. Emilio Negro, who has released a detailed expertise, as a singular replica with variants of a successful composition created by Giovanni Francesco Barbieri known as Guercino (Cento 1591- Bologna 1666) approximately between 1618 and 1619.
cm. 87x75 with frame
cm.65x53 without frame