Giuseppe Vermiglio

Who was Giuseppe Vermiglio?

Giuseppe Vermiglio was a Caravaggist painter from Northern Italy, active also in Rome.

Our knowledge of Vermiglio’s life is sketchy. It is probable that he was born in Alessandria. He spent the first two decades of the seventeenth century in Rome where, while training and working as an artist, he adopted a bohemian lifestyle with a tendency to become involved in painterly brawling: in 1604 he supported his master Adriano di Monteleone’s account of a dispute with two unknown artists which had led to Monteleone being wounded by his own wife; the following year Vermiglio was arrested and imprisoned after being discovered at the Monte di Brianza hostellry bearing an unlicensed sword; and in 1611 proceedings were brought against him for physically attacking the painter Silvio Oliviero. In 1618, still in Rome, he is recorded as a picture dealer.

Around 1620 he returned to northern Italy where he pursued his career as a painter in Piedmont and in Lombardy.

His art was profoundly influenced by Caravaggio.