The Artist of a Portrait
The painter Cavallucci (sometimes, Cavalucci) was born at Sermoneta in 1752 and died at Rome in 1795. A pupil of Stefano Pozzi, he was influenced by Batoni and Mengs. There is in his art some of the northern European feeling that had made its way into Rome at the end of the eighteenth century. Among his works are remembered the St Elias and the Purgatory in the Church of S. Martino ai Monti; a Venus with Ascanius at the Palazzo Cesarini in Rome; and a Clothing of St Bona at the Cathedral in Pisa. He is said to have painted St Benedict Joseph while the Saint was in ecstasy, or (as is perhaps more plausible), having seen the Saint in ecstasy, to have brought him to his studio and painted his portrait there.
[Enciclopedia Italiana di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti. Instituto della Enciclopedia Italiana. Rome. Ed. 1949 (1951). Vol. IX, p. 557]
