Public collection via the Cleveland Museum of Art
AT-00009158About the Artwork
In the pitch black of night, two groups of men are gathered in a forest. To the left, travelers apprehensively pause to watch a magician conjure terrifying apparitions. Since the Middle Ages, necromancy, the act of communing with the dead, was associated with male sorcerers. In Rosa's painting, the wizened necromancer who stands tall and resolute directly below a classical column is reminiscent of Moses, a predecessor to Renaissance depictions of sorcerers. Rosa's learned magicians not only invoke associations with philosophers and intellects, but they would have also referred to the artist himself and the intellectual elite with whom he associated in Florence. Just as a powerful magician could conjure strange creatures with his wand, so too could Rosa shape a strange world with his originality, intelligence, and the skillful use of paint and brush.
Inscriptions
Signed: "SR [monogram]"
Provenance
Family of the Marchese Giovanni Niccolini, Florence; [Heim Gallery, London]. Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund, 1977.
Exhibition history
The Night. Haus der Kunst, Munich (organizer) (November 1, 1998-February 17, 1999). Salvator Rosa (1615-1673): Bandits, Wilderness, and Magic. Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, TX (organizer) (December 12, 2010-March 27, 2011). The Novel and the Bizarre: Salvator Rosa’s Scenes of Witchcraft. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 15-June 14, 2015).
Data retrieved from the Cleveland Museum of Art on October 8, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Salvator Rosa (Italian, 1615–1673)
- Date
- c. 1645–49
- Medium
- oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- Framed: 76.2 x 9.6 cm (30 x 3 3/4 in.); Unframed: 54.5 cm (21 7/16 in.)
- Type
- Painting
- Classification
- Painting
- Department
- European Painting and Sculpture
- Credit line
- Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund
- Accession no.
- 1977.37.4
More by Salvator Rosa in museum collections
Open-access museum record · AT-00009158
Powered by Art Trackers