He was born in Civitavecchia in the Papal States and studied under Sebastiano Conca and Francesco Trevisani. Until 1738 he was a decorative painter of Roman churches and in 1729 was made a Knight of the Golden Spur; for this in England he would be called "the Chevalier Casali". He travelled to England in 1741 and stayed there for twenty-five years.[1] He was a teacher to James Durno. Some sources erroneously claim a birthdate of 1720 (e.g., Bryan and Hobbes). Among his English patrons were Thomas Coke, earl of Leicester (1697–1759), and Alderman William Beckford. He left England in 1766, after which he lived for some years in Rome, where he died in 1784.[1]
Cristo morto compianto dagli angeli, 1737, Catedrale San Liberatore, Magliano Sabina, Rieti
La famiglia di Dario davanti Alessandro Magno, private collection, Amsterdam
Adorazione dell'agnello mistico da parte dei ventiquattro anziani dell'Apocalisse, 1735, Musée du Barocco, Palazzo Chigi, Ariccia
References
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^ a b cIngamells, John (2004). "Casali, Andrea". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/4849. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
Bryan, Michael (1886). Robert Edmund Graves (ed.). Dictionary of Painters and Engravers, Biographical and Critical. Vol. I: A-K. London: George Bell and Sons. pp. 245–246.
Hobbes, James R. (1849). Picture collector's manual adapted to the professional man, and the amateur. London: T&W Boone. pp. 45–46.
Laing, Alastair (March 1994). "Masterpieces from Yorkshire Houses". York City Art Gallery. The Burlington Magazine, p. 196.
Coen, Paolo, Il mercato dei dipinti a Roma nel diciottesimo secolo, 2 vols., Florence, Leo S. Olschki, 2010, (publishes the two auctions held by Casali in London and his inventory of goods]