Cleopatra committing suicide with the venom of the asp snake. Florentine Baroque. Entourage of Felice Ficherelli.

Cleopatra committing suicide with the venom of the asp snake. ù

Florentine school. 

Entourage by Felice Ficherelli.

Oil painting on canvas.

Relined.

Mid-17th century.

There is an almost identical painting in the museum in Ljubljana, which has been confirmed by scholars as a painting by Felice Ficherelli, a Florentine Baroque painter.

Felice Ficherelli was born in Tuscany, in San Giminiano, but soon found his way to Florence, initially alongside the maestro Da Empoli.

He is greatly influenced by the Florentine painter Francesco Furini, from whom a tradition of soft and sensual painting was born in 17th century Florence, which often uses unusual and mysterious contrasts of light and female nudity.

His choice often falls on mythological subjects or sagas or novels, with a predilection towards subjects that speak of sensual love or tragic loves, of the crusades, of the imagined East.

The exotic character of this Cleopatra is undoubtedly manifested with a luxurious turban, decorated with a stone-studded jewel. 

Cleopatra's exposed breast, where the heroine approaches the small poisonous snake to commit suicide, highlights Eros and Thanatos together, a subtle and theatrical representation of death.

The melancholic gaze of the young and beautiful Cleopatra however remains ambiguous: seductive and suffering at the same time time. This painting can therefore be executed in the painter's workshop or by a follower of Felice Ficherelli who already had fortune during his life, and his works were copied by colleagues.