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(1) Giovanni Maria Viani
(b Bologna, 11 Sept 1636; d Bologna, 1700). He was a pupil of Flaminio Torri, and his first paintings (datable to c. 1650) suggest the art of Reni, absorbed through a study of Cantarini. Under the influence of Lorenzo Pasinelli, a colleague of his in Torri’s workshop, his forms gained solidity, but the mood of his paintings remained elegiac. This development is evident in two works in the Santuario della Madonna di S Luca in Bologna: Mary Magdalene and the altarpiece of St Pius V with the Polish Ambassador, which was probably painted in the same early period. The first documents relating to the artist and his first securely attributed works come from 1677: St Roch (Bologna, SS Vitale e Agricola) and the four frescoed lunettes in the portico of S Maria dei Servi, representing miraculous episodes of the life of S Filippo Benizi: Preaching to the Council of Lyon, Healing of the Sick, Succoured by Angels in the Desert and Ascending to Heaven. The canvas of St Benedict with the Peasants (signed and dated 1689; Bologna, S Michele in Bosco) is a copy of the lost fresco painted by Reni in the cloister of the same church. It forms a pair with St Bernard Tolomei Restores a Builder to Life (1693). One of Viani’s most interesting pictures is Diana and Endymion (1680s; Turin, Accad. Albertina), which shows a refined handling of colour. In the 1690s he produced St Andrew (Ozzano dell’Emilia, S Andrea), a work that demonstrates his individual interpretation of the Carracci school. His latest dated works are the two large ovals depicting the Virgin Appearing to St Ignatius and Christ Appearing to St Ignatius (1696) in the church of S Bartolomeo, Modena.
Part of the Viani family
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