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Carlo Dolci

Adoration of the Shepherds

c. 1670
oil on canvas
88.6 × 70.5 cm (34.9 × 27.8 in)

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In the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland · as of July 2026

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FROM THE CLEVELAND MUSEUM OF ART’S CATALOG

The historical significance of the Baroque painter Carlo Dolci, a precocious artist whose skill was recognized early by the leading Florentine patrons of his time, is often diminished due to his traditionalist compositions. Having gained local reputation as a talented portraitist and painter of religious narrative, Dolci's anti-Mannerist technique dismissed many of the leading Baroque trends as superfluous, retaining an unobtrusive and placid style in the manner of those before him. Having been a devout follower of the brotherhood of St. Benedict, Dolci draws upon a strict Christian iconography in his depiction of the shepherds' witness account of the birth of Christ. --Charles Eppley (January 2009)

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