Antonio De Dominici (Italian, 1737 – 1794), Portrait of a Woman in Black, signed and inscribed Roma. He was mainly in the service of the Bourbons.
Dominici came to Naples at a young age, where he worked from 1755 at the Accademia del Disegno in Naples after completing his training with Francesco Solimena. He later worked with Francesco de Mura at the court of the Bourbon Viceroys as a portraitist and decorative painter for the Bourbon palaces.
From the age of about six he lived in Naples: his family settled in Pizzofalcone, his father entered service as a gentleman in the house of Maria Lucrezia Reggio, princess of Palazzolo.
January 29 1777 Dominici expressed the plea to be admitted among the “directors” of the Drawing Academy, was appointed as a penniless master; however, he never got the position he wanted as director of the academy (in 1789 he refused to participate in the competition announced for the vacant position, disappointed that it had not been granted for seniority and for his merits). On February 8 Meanwhile, 1777 had been “admitted to the number of painters” of the Caserta palace, under the direction of the architect Carlo Vanvitelli.
He died in Naples in November 1794, leaving no children.
