PAINTER FROM NORTHERN ITALY IN THE 16TH CENTURY Three men and a woman holding a cat Oil on panel, 42X60 cm In the second book of his famous Treatise on the Art of Painting (1584), Lomazzo discusses the four 'temperaments' (or emotions) and their relationship to the figurative arts. To illustrate his point, the author describes a painting by Michelino da Besozzo as 'extravagant': '[...] he painted four rustics laughing together, two men and two women, and portrayed the oldest one clean-shaven, looking around and laughing as if amused beyond measure while with his left hand he lasciviously clutches the country woman on his left, who has in her arms a cat that also seems to be enjoying itself wagging its tail [...]'. Whatever the exact genesis of the description, the parallels between the work described by Lomazzo and the composition under examination are obvious and it is a genre that was widespread in Lombardy and Emilia during the 16th century. In fact, a similar group of these works was collected with more disparate attributions to Frangipane and Vincenzo Campi, but with differences in expressive details, poses and costumes, as can be seen by observing the panels in the Accademia Ligustica di Belle Arti, the Museum of Angers and the Museo Civico in Novara. The drawing related to Lomazzo's circle at the Accademia di Venezia should not be overlooked, attesting to the purely Lombard origin of this iconography and its relevance to the painter's atelier. Reference bibliography: B. Meijer, Examples of the Figurative Comic in the Lombard Renaissance, in Arte Lombarda, vol. XVI, 1971, pp. 263-264, figs. 3-8 U. Ruggeri, Gallerie dell'Accademia di Venezia: Disegni Lombardi, Milan 1982, pp. 72-73. n. 56 F. Paliaga in Rabisch, il grottesco nell'arte del Cinquecento, l'Accademia della Val di Blenio, Lomazzo e l'ambiente milanese, exhibition catalogue edited by G. Bora, Milan 1998, pp. 146-147, nn. 14-16