Ventura di Archangelo Salimbeni (also later called Bevilacqua; 20 January 1568 – 1613) was an Italian Counter-Maniera painter and printmaker highly influenced by the vaghezza and sensual reform of Federico Barocci.
He possibly spent some time, in Northern Italy and then moved to Rome in 1588 to work, together with others, on the fresco painting of the Vatican Library under pope Sixtus V.
Salimbeni returned to Siena in 1595. Here he persisted in a Reformist or Counter-Maniera style. He was here influenced by Federico Barocci as can be seen in the draperies, highlighted with abrupt changes of light and flickering surfaces, of his painting "Birth of a Virgin" in the San Domenico church in Ferrara (1607–1608).
He completed painting cycles (1595–1602) for Sienese churches such as the Oratory of Santa Trinità. He is known for detailed preparatory drawings, most of which are now in the Uffizi in Florence or the Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco. At around 1600, he began painting the "Life of St Hyacinth" for the Sienese church of Santo Spirito. These paintings show the innovative perspective and style of the Florentine Reformers Ludovico Cigoli Cigoli and Domenico Passignano Domenico Passignano. He continued to create paintings for churches throughout Italy, including Florence. At the Basilica della Santissima Annunziata di Firenze, he frescoed lunettes (1605–1608) illustrating events in the history of the Servite Order. In the Duomo di San Salvatore, he executed a magnificent John the Baptist.
At about the same time, around 1600, he got an assignment in Assisi for a fresco of the "Resurrection of Christ" and the "Dying Saint Clare is visited by the pope" in the vault of chapel of San Massimo in the Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli.
This period saw a proliferation of new assignments: three paintings for the church San Lorenzo in San Pietro in Montalcino, the "Donation of the Keys" (1599), the "Glorification of the Eucharist" (1600), and the "Crucifixion" (1604).
At the same time he was painting the "Vision of Gregory the Great" and the "Punishment of David" in the Basilica of San Pietro in Perugia. The papal legate, cardinal Bonifazio Bevilacqua (1571–1627), who had commissioned these paintings, was so pleased that he invested Ventura Salimbeni with the Order of the Golden Spur, a very selective papal order. He was even authorized from now on to name himself Cavalieri Bevilacqua. He painted the canvas of the Ascension of the Virgin (1607) for San Frediano, Pisa.
In 1612 he painted the "Life of Saint Galganus" for the Church of the Santuccio in Siena with the hermit saint set in a wooded landscape.
His last work of art was the oil painting the "Marriage of the Virgin" for the Seminario Diocesano in Foligno in 1613.
In the period between 1589 and 1594 he also made in Rome some etchings, of which seven survive. They are among the finest Italian prints of the period. The earliest dated, and the largest, is the Baptism of Christ of 1589, which he produced in collaboration with the more experienced Ambrogio Brambilla.
