Artist

Francesco Cairo

Portrait of Francesco Cairo
Portrait of Francesco Cairo

1607–1665

Francesco Cairo was an Early Baroque Italian painter. 7 works are cataloged here, principally at Kunsthistorisches Museum, most of them oil paintings. Francesco Cairo was born in Milan.

Francesco Cairo (26 September 1607 – 27 July 1665), also known as Francesco del Cairo, was an Italian Baroque painter active in Lombardy and Piedmont. He is also known as Il Cavalière del Cairo, because in Turin, he received the Order of Saints Maurice and Lazarus in recognition of his merit. Cairo led a successful career as court painter at Turin and painted many large altarpieces for religious orders; the range of his stylistic development during nearly 40 years is enormous, yet his early cabinet pictures, of macabre and morbid subjects, are often regarded as some of his most fascinating work. They marked the end of the pestanti painters, and the sentiments that distinguished early 17th-century Milanese painting.

Works by Francesco Cairo

Collections represented

All 7 museums →

Catalog records compiled from museum open-access collections; the artworks shown are in the public domain. Spotted an error in this record? Tell us.