Praying Monks

Praying Monks is an example of a genre painting by the Genoese native Alessandro Magnasco. The scene is dramatised by a sharp chiaroscuro, typical of the High Baroque period, and by the play of light created by the use of rapid impasto layers of painting, which emphasise the modelling of the draperies. Members of the prominent Florentine Medici family, in whose service Magnasco spent several years, also found a liking for his paintings.

The work originally came from the collection of the famous Czech graphic artist, painter and illustrator Viktor Stretti.