With Saint Francis in ecstasy comforted by the angel opens the selection of works by Gioacchino Assereto, one of the most gifted protagonists of the Genoese school of painting of the seventeenth century. Having arrived at Palazzo Bianco in 1898, following the purchase of the Palazzo Patrone in Piazza della Zecca, it is a work of great quality but problematic in terms of dating, to be placed perhaps shortly before 1630.

Performed with a sensitive technique, it is a very concentrated composition, to which dramatic light version add acute notes white lumeggiature. He interprets ecstasy as a lacerating event: the bruised flesh of the saint, his robe, his hands with stigmata, the skull that emerges from the shadow express a precise concept of Imitatio Christi, which culminates in physical contact between Christ and Francis, whose head, with clear symbolic intent, covers that of the Crucifix.

The dense composition, but not suffocated, less torn than other works by Assereto, focuses on the figure of Christ (grandiose in proportions but classically elegant in the positure of the body by the soft flesh permeated with light) surrounded by brutal and brazen executioners, from which emanates, especially in the vibrant expression of pain of the face, a suffering but contained emotionality. Datable at the end of 1620, and purchased in 1966, the painting of the Genoese author appears permeated with Lombard culture, but it seems stimulated also by the lesson of Giulio Cesare Procaccini and affected by the study of works by Van Dyck present in Genoa

In the great "nocturnal" painting of the Cambiaso Palace in Strada Nuova, Assereto depicts the suicide of the Roman tribune Marco Porcio Cato who, at the outbreak of the civil war between Caesar and Pompey, took the latter’s side and followed him to the East. After the killing of Pompey and the defeat of his followers, Cato decided to end his life by piercing his belly with a sword, but was rescued and medicated; during the night, left alone, he tore the bandages and, reopening the wound, caused his own death with clear determination. The night setting of the crowded scene, the choice to represent the most tragic of the episode, as well as the use of an artificial light from torches, that accentuates the exasperated gestures of the characters and focuses attention on the hand of Cato and his sword - instrument of the tragic act - appear elements that contribute to infuse the composition a tone agitated by figurative drama.
The canvas - datable to the years immediately following 1639, when the sources report news of a Roman stay of the painter - shows the influence of Nordic caravaggeschi as Matthias Stomer and Gerrit van Honthorst and reveals the great emotional and expressive force of the painting of this artist. The painting by Assereto, however, was attributed by nineteenth-century historiography to van Honthorst, who was also referred to as the author of the biblical subject La maga di Endor evokes for Saul the shadow of Samuel, work that was the pendant of Cato when the painting was in the collection of the marquises Cambiaso.

Descended from an established family of painters and raised in a fervent intellectual environment, Valerio Castello was a very early artist, able to overcome the teachings of even established local masters, to look at models of international importance: Procaccini, Correggio, Parmigianino, Veronese, Rubens and Van Dyck are the landmarks of the artistic path of this painter who played a pivotal role, although in his short life, in the transition from baroque to rococo aesthetics, acting as one of the most original and innovative personalities of the seventeenth century, not only Genoese.
In this small but delightful painting he shows an absolute mastery in receiving and reworking the stimuli of the great masters and, together, provides a masterful representation of intimate and delicate maternal love.
The tender gesture of the Virgin, intent on covering the Child without disturbing his sleep, is resolved in a graceful composition, in which the soft pastel shades are treated with a fresh and agile pictorial vein. The brushstroke spreads the color now with transparent veils, which make the lightness of the veil and the sheets where the child is beautifully laid, on which the painter pauses to emphasize infant grace and sweetness, now for fuller backgrounds, found in the red drape on the background and in the dress of the Madonna.
The elongated profile of the Virgin, the tapered fingers, the elegance of the movement closely resemble the women of Parmigianino, but the style is less artificial and more direct, mediated by compositional schemes that refer to Van Dyck, of which, also, Valerio provides a personal, very original interpretation.

Domenico Piola, perhaps with the help of his son Anton Maria, demonstrates his great ability to orchestrate a refined chromatic range in a composition of classical mould and academic taste. In an elegant and eventful succession, the allegories of the Arts are identifiable: the Painting is depicted with palette and brushes in hand and is addressed to Architecture, which holds in his hand a lead wire and a team; the Sculpture is intent on modeling a marble bust, while the Music is tuning a lute.V The armillary sphere and the telescope with which it looks at the sky identify, finally, Astronomy. Above, the Fame with the trumpet carries the laurel crowns destined to the Arts, while the two powerful male figures in the foreground are Atlas and Hercules, intent on holding the globe. This painting is a replica of a larger work that Domenico executed for the Marquis Niccolò Pallavicino, in conjunction with another large painting depicting the family of Darius at the feet of Alexander, whose replica is also preserved at Palazzo Bianco. The payment for the two paintings for the Genoese nobleman was made in 1694, which is therefore the post quem term for the execution of the two replicas of Palazzo Bianco.

Recognized as a prominent figure in Casa Piola, Gregorio De Ferrari is the author of this canvas depicting the Samaritan woman at the Well. The dynamism of the figures veiled by a subtle melancholy, the careful compositional choice that renews the traditional schemes, the discreet reference to illustrious models give account of the artist’s heterogeneous artistic culture, which certainly does not end in the local context. Before establishing a lasting and fruitful collaboration with Domenico Piola, the artist, trained in the Genoese workshop of Domenico Fiasella, has the opportunity to stay in Parma, Florence, Rome, where he can study the painting of undisputed masters.The contact with the great European Baroque season is particularly evident in the original space research that characterizes the large decorative companies commissioned to Gregorio after his final return to Genoa. Not only in stately homes like Palazzo Rosso, but also in the most important Genoese churches

The stylistic signature of Gregorio De Ferrari is revealed with particular elegance and refinement in this splendid painting, which can be dated around 1690. The artist has respected the most traditional iconography to depict this episode of the Gospel of John, which tells the moment when, after the Resurrection, Jesus meets at the tomb Magdalene who was weeping and refuses the embrace of the woman, who would like to hold him. The sacred subject, deprived of its solemn and miraculous character, is proposed in a new worldly and sensual key, which transforms the encounter between Jesus and the Magdalene in a carefree and almost gallant moment; an interpretation far removed from the models established by the traditional iconography of the Counter-Reformation.Christ is caught in an elegant and artificial pose, harmonized with the oblique course of the composition; the gesture of the hand of Mary Magdalene is matched by that of Christ, while the thick drapery of her dress corresponds to the vaporous mantle of him.
In this work, which preludes to the results of the rococo, the artist reveals how his way has been conditioned by the example of Correggio, with the modeled soft and soft and the delicate tonalism of the landscape played on a palette that favors pastel colors. The canvas also has a pendant - also in the Musei di Strada Nuova - depicting Tobias and the angel, made by his son Lorenzo.