Piranesi, Guercino and Goold’s fascination for the Baroque

The chapter investigates Archbishop Goold’s collection of I migliori Disegni del Barbieri da Cento detto il Guercino, engraved in 1764 by Giovanni Battista Piranesi and Francesco Bortolozzi. Collected as part of a larger group of Piranesi volumes, these reproductions of exquisite Italian drawings bear witness to Goold’s fascination for the late Baroque, a key feature in the Archbishop’s collecting activity. By looking at Guercino’s drawings and their connection with canvases recently discovered as part of Goold’s collection, the chapter highlights how the Archbishop’s taste was informed by a preference for the Roman and Bolognese painting schools and specifically for what Wittkower defined as ‘classical Baroque’: a style developed in Rome by the Bolognese pupils of the Carracci Academy during the first and the fourth decades of the seventeenth century.