Giordano, Luca

Giordano, Luca (l`kä jōrdä`nō), 1632–1705, Italian decorative painter, b. Naples. He was the pupil of Ribera and Pietro da Cortona. He imitated the works of the great masters with amazing speed and facility and ultimately based his style upon those of Veronese and Cortona. Giordano decorated the cupola of the Corsini Chapel and a ceiling in the Palazzo Riccardi (1682–83), both in Florence. In 1692 he went to Madrid, where he remained ten years and produced numerous works in oil and in fresco, achieving fame and wealth. On the death of his patron Charles II, he accompanied Philip V to Naples. His pictures are in the leading European galleries, particularly those of Madrid, Vienna, and Naples. His best-known frescoes in Naples include The Story of Judith (San Martino) and Christ Expelling the Traders from the Temple (San Filippo Neri). In Spain he painted airy and luminous frescoes in the Chapel of San Lorenzo and in the Escorial, Madrid, and in the churches and palaces of Madrid and Toledo.

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Giordano, Luca

(born Oct. 18, 1632, Naples—died Jan. 3, 1705, Naples) Italian painter active in Naples. He was inspired by the work of José de Ribera and (after extensive travel in Florence, Rome, and Venice) that of Paolo Veronese and Pietro da Cortona, whose influence is most evident in his huge ceiling fresco in the gallery of the Medici-Riccardi Palace (1682–85/86), Florence. In 1692 he went to Spain as court painter to Charles II; his frescoes in El Escorial are considered his best works of the period. In 1702 he returned to Naples, where he completed his last great work, the ceiling of the Treasury Chapel of the Certosa di San Martino (1704). His oil and fresco output was enormous, and his subject matter ranged from religious to mythological themes; his nickname was Luca fa presto (“Luca, work quickly”). Many of his frescoes in Naples were destroyed or damaged in World War II.