Annibale Carracci
Italian, 1560–1609
In 1595, Annibale moved to Rome, and between 1597 and 1601 he frescoed the ceiling of the Galleria Farnese in Rome; this was perhaps the most important work of its kind since Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling frescoes at the beginning of the sixteenth century. In Rome Annibale also produced a number of highly influential altarpieces and devotional works. Increasingly ill and despondent following an apoplectic attack in 1605, Annibale created few works during the last four years of his life, dying in Rome in 1609.