CARRACCI, LODOVICO, AGOSTINO and ANNI BALE, three celebrated Italian painters, were born at Bologna in and 1560 respectively. They were the founders of the so-called eclectic school of painting,—the principle of which was to study in the works of the great masters the several excel lences for which they had been respectively pre-eminent, and to combine these in the productions of the school itself.
Lodovico, the eldest, son of a butcher, was uncle to the two younger, Agostino and Annibale, sons of a tailor, and had nearly finished his professional studies before the others had begun their education. He studied under Tintoretto in Venice, and ulti mately projected the opening of a rival school in his native place. He then sent for his two nephews, and induced them to abandon their handicrafts (Agostino being a goldsmith, and Annibale a tailor) for the profession of painting. Agostino he first placed under the care of Fontana, retaining Annibale in his own studio; but he afterwards sent both to Venice and Parma to copy the works of Titian, Tintoretto and Correggio. On their return, the three relatives, assisted by an eminent anatomist, Anthony de la Tour, opened, in 1589, an academy of painting under the name of the Incamminati. The affability and zeal of the Carracci rapidly lifted their academy in popular estimation. They con tinued together till, at the invitation of Cardinal Farnese, Anni bale and Agostino went to Rome in 160o to paint the gallery of the cardinal's palace. Thence the latter went to Parma to paint the great salon of the Casino. Here he died in 1602, when on the eve of finishing his renowned painting of "Celestial, Terres trial and Venal Love." Annibale continued to work alone at the Farnese gallery till the designs were completed, when he retired to Naples, where he died in 1609. Lodovico always remained at his academy in Bologna. He died in 1619, and was interred in the church of Santa Maria Maddalena. The works of Lodovico are numerous in the chapels of Bologna. The most famous are: —the "Madonna standing on the moon, with St. Francis and St. Jerome beside her, attended by a retinue of angels," "John the Baptist," "St. Jerome," "St. Benedict," and "St. Cecilia" ; and the "Limbo of the Fathers." With skill in painting Agostino combined the greatest proficiency in engraving (which he had studied under Cornelius de Cort). Annibale's chief works are: the "Dead Christ in the lap of the Madonna," the "Infant and St. John," "St. Catherine," "St. Roch distributing alms" (now in the Dresden gallery), and the "Saviour bewailed by the Maries." See A. Venturi, I Carracci e la loro scuola (1895).