Crespi, Giovanni Battista, Known as Il Cerano

CRESPI, Giovanni Battista, Known as Il Cerano. - Painter, architect and sculptor, b. at Cerano in 1557, d. at Milan in 1633. He worked not only in Milan but also in Rome and Venice. His paintings are very numerous and reveal grandeur of composition, breadth of brushwork and notable plastic force.

Besides a series of large canvases painted for the Milanese Duomo, with Miracles and events from the life of St. Charles Borromeo, mention should be made of the Promessa francescana, dated 1600, in the Kaiser Friedrich-Museum in Berlin; the Baptism of Christ in the gallery of Frankfurt (1601); the Pietà in the Civico Museo of Novara (1610); the notable Baptism of St. Augustine (1618) in the church of S. Marco in Milan, and the Madonna del Rosario for the church of S. Lazzaro, now in the Brera picture gallery. Other works of his are to be found in the galleries of Florence, Cremona, Turin, etc.

In 1629 he was appointed superintendent of the engineering and statuary works of the Duomo; he also built, likewise in Milan, the church of S. Paolo and carved various bas-reliefs of its facade. He was also the designer of the colossal statue of St. Charles at Arona, of which a drawing by him is preserved in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana.