TEMPESTA, Antonio. — Painter, b. in Florence in 1555, d. in Rome in 1630. Pupil of Jan van der Straat and of Santi di Tito.
Very young, he found work at the court of Pope Gregory XIII. He then devoted himself especially to engraving, confirming his gifts as an easy and pleasant narrator, even if sometimes a little superficial, of hunting scenes, battles, and banquets. Tempesta is in any case a mannerist who already opens the door to true Baroque with a very refined sense of decoration. Despite his vast pictorial output, not many paintings can today be attributed to him with certainty. However, among the most important, according to general opinion, are, among the frescoes, those of the Vatican Gallery (now Gallery of Maps); Fame and Honor in the Swiss Loggia; some decorations in the Rospigliosi Palace, at the Quirinal, in the Santacroce and Giustiniani palaces, in the chapel of St. John in Fonte, of St. Anthony Abbot at St. John de’ Fiorentini, at St. Stephen in the Round, at St. Pancras in Rome and the decorations in the Scala Regia of Palazzo Farnese at Caprarola; then in various galleries. Among his engravings: scenes from the life of St. George; 12 scenes from the life of Alexander the Great; the Metamorphoses of Ovid; countless scenes, executed in collaboration with Bartsch, and the illustrations of Torquato Tasso’s *Gerusalemme Liberata* with full-page scenes.