Alexander the Great Threatened by His Father

This rare early work by the Bolognese painter Donato Creti dramatizes the famous quarrel between the young Alexander and his father, Philip II of Macedon, who advances sword in hand while the future conqueror recoils. Creti, a refined classicist who later supplied the astronomical paintings in the Vatican Observatory, here pits vigorous gestural drama against the antique costume and architecture beloved of late-Bolognese painting. Painted probably around 1700 to 1705, the canvas shows the young master of Bologna poised between the dying Baroque and the more delicate style of the incoming century.