Michiel o Michael Sweerts (Bruxelles 1618 - Goa 1664) cerchia di

Michiel or Michael Sweerts (Brussels 1618 - Goa 1664) circle of Interior with soldiers Oil on canvas 32 x 41 cm Michiel Sweerts arrived in Rome, where he met the group of Dutch and Flemish artists led by the painter Pieter van Laer known as Il Bamboccio, who were devoted to depicting scenes of popular life in Rome and the Roman countryside. Thanks to van Lear's nickname, the group took the name Bamboccianti. Their painting depicted with theatricality the everyday life of the people, the facts told were not taken from reality, but were true enactments to tell the folklore of the eternal city, which at the time was overcrowded due to the recent agrarian crises in the countryside. The dizzyingly heightened social unrest exacerbated the malaise; the streets were filled with wanderers, beggars, peddlers, peasants, and soldiery. Sweerts is universally held to be on the sidelines of the bamboozlers, in that his popular characters retain a dignity, albeit a melancholy one, given the conditions. Sweerts does not look at the minute people with the hilarity of most of his colleagues, who saw in the scenes he painted an unworthy but entertaining spectacle. After leaving Rome he returned to Flanders, where he opened an art school. He later left as a missionary for China, but was expelled from the country. He reached Goa, India, where he died in 1664. Michiel or Michael Sweerts (Brussels 1618 - Goa 1664) circle of Interior With Soldiers Oil on canvas 32 x 41 cm