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Orsola Maddalena Caccia (1596 - 1676) Salvator Mundi Oil on canvas, 74 x 68 cm CACCIA, Orsola Maddalena Giovanni Romano Daughter of the painter Guglielmo and Laura Oliva, her exact date of birth is unknown, but the fact that the death certificate, dated July 26, 1676, states that she was eighty years old, roughly dates it to the late 16th century. A confirmation comes from the possibility of glimpsing her first interventions in her father's paintings only after the year 1615. Around 1620, C. entered the Ursuline convent of Bianzè, where she remained until April 15, 1625, the date of the foundation (Negri, 1896, p. 116) of a new convent of nuns in Moncalvo: here, Caccia's father, the financier of the new institute, had his four daughters who had become nuns transferred. In a petition to the bishop of Casale preceding the act of foundation there is explicit mention of C.'s activity in collaboration with her father according to precise financial agreements (Minoglio, p. 105). Another document of particular interest in this regard is Guglielmo's will, dated November 5, 1625 (Negri, 1896, pp. 120-122), from which it appears that Orsola Maddalena and her sister Francesca, who also later became a nun, would be entitled of her father’s small paintings and drawings until their death, as such material was useful for their pictorial activity. In fact, for a long time after her father's death, C. repeats in her feminine and diligent ways her paternal themes, further draining the manner in devotional paintings and altarpieces for numerous churches, not only in Piedmont. Her painting was also successful at the Savoy court; her letters connected with painting works directed to Infanta Margherita of Savoy (1643) remain. In 1665 she was certainly still active; on April 17 of that year she welcomed the painter Laura Bottero into the convent of Moncalvo with the name of Sister Candida Virginia: the act of profession specifies the duties of the novice towards the convent as an artist in her own right, albeit under the supervision of C., and as a future teacher of other novices inclined to painting (see Schede Vesme, p. 188). After 1665 there is no further direct news of C. until the registration of her death (July 25, 1676). As a painter, Guglielmo Caccia's daughter did not have much posthumous good fortune, indeed the eighteenth-century sources seem to prefer her sister Francesca (in religion Anna Guglielma), who, having died at the age of twenty on December 18, 1628 (Negri, 1896, pp. 211 ff.), does not must have produced anything truly personal (no work of her hand is known). Only recently (1964) the identification of some still lifes by the hand of C. (three in the municipality of Moncalvo and others on the antique market in Turin and Florence) has renewed the interest of scholars in her. In all probability the beginnings of C. are to be found in paintings such as the Immaculate Conception of the parish church of Rosazza, the Madonna and Child Asleep of the parish church of Bianzè, the Nativity of the Palazzo Bianco deposits in Genoa, where ideas typical of the father are carried out by a more diligent and diminutive hand, which tends make the chromatic range veer towards cold and bluish tones. Chronologically, these works fall between 1615 and 1620, and will soon be followed by many others in which C.'s personality becomes increasingly independent. The upper part of the Martyrdom of St. Maurice at the Capuchins of Turin (c. 1623) is certainly hers and the St. Maurice in the church of S. Francesco in Moncalvo also belongs to her hand, at least in large part, left unfinished by his father upon his death (1625) and completed by his daughter immediately afterwards by testamentary provision. The reconstruction of the subsequent path, always fairly homogeneous, relies on the few dated paintings that have come down to us: the S. Antonio in the church of the Madonna in Lu Monferrato (1632), the Saints Lucia, Agata and Liberata in S. Antonio in Moncalvo (1637), the S. Giovanni Battista in the parish church of Montemagno (1644). Unfortunately, both the Holy Family, already at Vincenzo De Abbate in Alba, datable to 1648, and the S. Antonio, dated 1665, already at Giovanni Minoglio in Moncalvo, have been lost: it is therefore impossible to chronologically order the late activity of the C., characterized by a heavy darkening of the colors and an ever lesser formal control. The painter's production certainly exceeds one hundred preserved paintings, and below is only a brief list, in alphabetical order by location, of more typical and qualitatively less superficial works. Biella, S. Sebastiano: Trinity and angels Casale Monferrato, Madonna del Tempio: Coronation of the Virgin; Civic Museum: Concert of Angels. Castellazzo Bormida, S. Maria: Mystical Marriage of St. Catherine. Chieri, S. Giorgio: Massacre of the Innocents. Genoa, Annunziata del Vastato: Nativity. Moncalvo, S. Francesco: Nativity of the Baptist; Jesus Assisted by Angels in the Desert; S. Antonino; S. Luke in his study; a good number of small paintings are kept in the town hall, all from the Ursuline convent then suppressed, Montabone, parish church: Banner of S. Orsola, Pavia, church of the Carmine: Transverberation of S. Teresa (copy of the paternal original in S. Teresa in Turin); oratory of the Ghislieri college: Nativity; Civic Art Gallery: Nativity of the Virgin; Madonna and Child with an Angel. Rome, Galleria Spada: Ecstasy of St. Francis. San Salvatore Monferrato, church of the hospital: Holy Family at Work. Turin, Pinacoteca Sabauda: S. Cecilia. Trino, S. Bartolomeo: Presentation at the Temple; church of the Franciscans: B. Salvatore d'Orta. Villadeati, parish church: Christ assisted by angels in the desert. Villanova d'Asti, S. Martirio: Intercession of St. Charles Borromeo. For a drawing by the C. characteristic of its later phase, see the sheet with figures of saints in prayer in the Royal Library of Turin (cat. Bertini, n. 275). Sources and Bibl.: Schede Vesme, I, Turin 1963, pp. 188, 229-231 (with almost all the documents; already publ. in Atti della Soc. piem. di archeol. e belle arti, XIV [1932]); P. A. Orlandi, The Pictorial Alphabet, Bologna 1704, p. 240; G. A. Irico, Rerum Patriae libri tres, Milan 1745, pp. 226, 275, 364 ff.; F. Bartoli, News of the paintings..., I, Venice 1776, p. 122; G. Della Valle, Lives... written by M. Giorgio Vasari..., VII, Siena 1792, pp. 14, 58 ff.; G. De Conti, Portrait of the city of Casale... until the current year 1794, edited by G. Serrafero, Casale Monferrato 1966, pp. 27, 46 ff.; L. Lanzi, Pictorial History of Italy, Milan 1824-25, IV, p. 402; G. Minoglio, Moncalvo. Brief historical notes., Turin 1877, pp. 17, 21 ff.; F. Negri, Il Moncalvo (news on documents), in Rivista di storia,arte,archeologia per le provincie di Alessandria e Asti, IV (1895), pp. 266 ff., 269 ff.; V(1896), pp. 116, 118-124, 127, 210 ss., 218-23; C. Lupano, Moncalvo sacra…, Moncalvo 1899, pp. 39-41, 72, 90, 113-118, 175, 181, 185; F. Negri, Il santuario di Crea, in Riv. di storia,arte,archeol. per le provincie di Alessandria e Asti, XI (1902), 2, pp. 16, 20; Id., I pittori di Trino, in Il beato Oglerio nella storia e nell'arte di Trino e di Lucedio, Casale Monferrato 1914, pp. 68, 71; A. Venturi, History of Italian Art, IX, 7, Milan 1934, pp. 566 ff.; N. Cambursano, Rebirth of masterpieces, in Honors to Msgr G. Bolla, Asti s.d. (but 1948), pp. non nn.; A. Bertini, The Italian ones. of the Bibl. Reale di Torino, Rome 1958, p. 40; A. Griseri, The autumn of Mannerism at the court of Carlo Emanuele I and a Caravaggesque arrival, in Paragone, XII (1961), 141, pp. 25 ff.; A. Peroni, Restorations and new accessions of the civic art collections (catalog), Pavia 1963, p. 51; V. Moccagatta, Guglielmo Caccia known as il Moncalvo..., in Arte lombarda, VIII (1963), 2, pp. 183-192, 228, 231-243 (passim); Italian Still Life (catalog), Milan 1964, pp. 24 2.; G. Romano, Still Lifes in Piedmont, in Arte antica e moderna, 1964, pp. 428-432; V. Viale, Civic Museum F. Borgogna: The paintings (catalog), Vercelli 1969, p. 62; G. Romano, N. Mussoa Roma and Casale, in Paragone, XXII (1971), 255, pp. 54 ff.; U. Thieme-F. Becker, Künstlerlexikon, V, p. 334 (p. 333 for Francesca).