User:Jnestorius/FChiari

Fabrizio Chiari (c.1615–1695) was an Italian painter and engraver who spent his entire life in Rome. Little of known of his life; Nicola Pio's short biography is unreliable. Allegedly self-taught, his early works were copied from Nicholas Poussin and Domenichino and he retained their classicism while later influenced by Pietro da Cortona. He did commissions for the Barberini family, and foreign clients including Christina of Sweden. He was in the team under Cortona which decorated the Quirinal Palace in 1656–7. According to Pietro Santi Bartoli, Chiari salvaged fragments of the funerary urn of Marcia Otacilia Severa, found during renovations to Santa Maria in Via Lata.

Chiari was active in the Accademia di San Luca, as an associate from 1635 and fellow from 1655. He was also a member of the Virtuosi al Pantheon. In 1669, Chiari, Giovanni Maria Morandi and Giovanni Francesco Grimaldi were appointed by the Accademia to investigate how to fix the degradation of the altarpiece of its chapel, St Luke Painting the Virgin; attributed to Raphael, it was replaced by a 1623 copy by Antiveduto Grammatica. In 1673, Chiari was among the Accademia's lecturers in life drawing, and in 1682 he replaced Morandi in the jury of the its student competition. The Accademia has an anonymous portrait of Chiari in middle age. Pio's unpublished biography of Chiari was to be illustrated with a drawing by Filippo Minei, which has not been located. Works bequeathed by Chiari to the Accademia have been lost.

Works
Chiari's early etchings from drawings by Nicolas Poussin are described by Michael Bryan as "executed in a scratchy but masterly style". Some of Chiari's church paintings mentioned by Filippo Titi are no longer known.

Uncompleted works
Chiari was commissioned to paint frescoes in the Virtuosi's confraternity chapel in the Pantheon, but in his absence Francesco Cozza did this from 1659.