A standing woman seen from behind

Salvator Rosa was a painter, draughtsman, etcher, poet, and actor. He studied in Naples where the influence of Jusepe de Ribera is seen translated to his expressive brushwork and large scaled, usually ¾ length, figures. After studying with his brother-in-law Francesco Fracanzano between 1632-1635, he was in the workshop of Ribera and then that of Aniello Falcone. This may have been the source for Rosa’s interest in gênre paintings and battle scenes with violent incidents.
Early in Rosa’s career, he produced spontaneous oil sketches on paper, later he was influenced by the Bamboccianti and Pieter Van Laer, whose style he soon rejected. Leaving Naples for Rome in 1635, Rosa became a protégé of the Neapolitan Cardinal Brancacci, who, upon becoming bishop of Viterbo, allowed Rosa to work there on important commissions. In Rome, in one of his satires, he insulted the all-important GianLorenzo Bernini, (which might have been the reason he accepted the invitation of Giovanni Carlo de’Medici to come to Florence). Salvatore Rosa was one of the most original artists and extravagant personalities of the 17th century. In 1640 under the wing of Mattia de’Medici he founded the Accademia dei Percosssi, which gathered intellectuals. From 1640-49, Rosa painted for the nobles in Florence, as well as the de’Medici. He was, with Giovanni Carlo de’Medici, at the center of the literary and theatric life of Florence.
To win wider fame, Rosa returned to Rome and painted erudite philosophical allegories commissioned for grand historic subjects. These were influenced by Raphael and Poussin and contrasted with the pastoral scenes of Claude Lorraine. Rosa’s interest in rugged beauty and savage wildness was paramount, and in the mid-seventeenth-century, he created scenes of rocky, wild, and dramatic mountainous landscapes for which he is most known, and which were most influential to other artists. Yet Rosa also painted macabre subjects and grand historical themes; he was, moreover, the most significant satirical poet of the Italian 17th century, and there is a close relationship between his poetry and painting.
Rosa remained dissatisfied, despite being lionized by nobility and flattered by being invited to France by Louis XIV. His earliest biographers, Fillip Balinucci and Giovanni Bastista Passeri, both of whom knew him well, described at length his fiery temperament, his learning and vivacious wit, and his often-outrageous treatment of his patrons. He showed his work at the annual exhibition, held at the Pantheon.
Rosa was a swift draughtsman with pen and ink and touches of wash. His figural studies were to study poses or groups, very much alive, and were often of humble subjects. The drawing shown here, probably circa 1635, is from his first Roman period.