Rosa, Anella de (1613–1649)

Neapolitan painter. Name variations: Anna di Rosa or Aniella Beltrano. Born in Naples in 1613; possibly murdered in 1649; a pupil of Francesco di Rosa; niece of Massimo Stanzioni; married Agostino Beltrano (a painter).

Both pupils of Massimo Stanzioni, Anella de Rosa and her husband Agostino Beltrano were Neapolitan painters who flourished about the middle of the 17th century. Agostino was a good fresco painter and "more than ordinary in his coloring in oil." The talented and beautiful Anella, who acquired a reputation as a historical artist, painted in the same style and worked with her husband. The pictures attributed to her were highly praised, especially that of the Birth and Death of the Virgin in the church of Santa Maria de' Turchini. In 1649, according to a Neapolitan art gossip named De' Dominici, Anella was stabbed to death by her husband in a fit of jealous rivalry, over favoritism shown by their master Stanzioni. The 36-year-old survived her wounds only long enough to pardon him. Agostino then fled to France and wandered as an outcast until 1659, when he returned to Naples and resumed his work. He lived, tormented by remorse, until 1665.

But the entire murder theory is debunked by Germaine Greer in The Obstacle Race. Greer claims that the true scandal was Anella de Rosa's reverence for her master Stanzioni, causing her to become his "willing collaborator, transferring his sketches to the canvas, often doing nearly all the painting, leaving to him only the finishing touches to faces and hands" if the "work in question was a private commission." In 1638, an explosion brought down the roof of Santa Maria de' Turchini, destroying Anella de Rosa's only authenticated work—though The Drunkenness of Noah in the Calbresi Collection (Rome) and Isaac Blessing Jacob in the Majetti Collection have been attributed to her.

sources:

Clement, Clara Erskine. Painters, Sculptors, Architects, Engravers, and Their Works. Hurd & Houghton, 1874.

Greer, Germaine. The Obstacle Race. NY: Farrar, Straus, 1979.