Two putti draped with a garland the one at right holding a mask

Printmaking in woodcut and engraving came to Northern Italy within a few decades of their invention north of the Alps. Engraving probably came first to Florence in the 1440s, the goldsmith Maso Finiguerra (1426–64) used the technique. Italian engraving caught the very early Renaissance, 1460–1490. Print copying was a widely accepted practice, as well as copying of paintings viewed as images in their own right.

By the last decades of the 16th century, the refined Mannerism style had ceased to be an effective means of religious art expression. Catholic Church fought against Protestant Reformation to re-establish its dominance in European art by infusing Renaissance aesthetics enhanced by a new exuberant extravagance and penchant for the ornate. The new style was coined Baroque and roughly coincides with the 17th century. Baroque emphasizes dramatic motion, clear, easily interpreted grandeur, sensuous richness, drama, dynamism, movement, tension, emotional exuberance, and details, and often defined as being bizarre, or uneven. The term Baroque likely derived from the Italian word barocco, used by earlier scholars to name an obstacle in schematic logic to denote a contorted idea or involuted process of thought. Another possible source is the Portuguese word barroco (Spanish barrueco), used to describe an irregular or imperfectly shaped pearl, and this usage still survives in the jeweler’s term baroque pearl. Baroque spread across Europe led by the Pope in Rome and powerful religious orders as well as Catholic monarchs to Northern Italy, France, Spain, Flanders, Portugal, Austria, southern Germany, and colonial South America.

Polidoro da Caravaggio was an Italian Renaissance painter and architect. He was born in Caravaggio, Italy, around 1499 and is believed to have trained under the painter Andrea del Sarto in Florence. Polidoro is best known for his frescoes, which often depict mythological scenes and are characterised by vivid colours and dramatic compositions. He worked mainly in Rome, where he collaborated with the artist Maturino da Firenze on several projects, including the decoration of the Villa Farnesina. In addition to his work as a painter, Polidoro was also an accomplished architect. He designed several buildings in Rome, including the Palazzo Milesi and the Palazzo Caprini. Polidoro died in 1543, aged 44, and his work had a significant influence on later artists, particularly those working in the Baroque style.