Niccolo d'Ardia Caracciolo was born in Dublin to an Italian father Ferdinando Caracciolo, Prince of Cursi, from an old Italian family in Naples, while his mother was a native of Waterford, of the Fitzgerald dynasty of Waterford Castle.
He was educated at the Oratory School in England and following graduation he travelled to Florence at the age of nineteen to study art. He continued to travel back and forth to northern Italy for the majority of his life.
In 1964 Caracciolo was one of the painte
rs chosen to paint a replica of the Sistine Chapel for the scenery of the 1965 film The Agony and the Ecstasy, on the life of Michelangelo.
From 1975 to 1978 he lived at Rosemount House, near Moate in County Westmeath, where he painted many scenes of the surrounding countryside.
In 1983 he became an associate Member of the Royal Hibernian Academy and in 1984 a full member of the RHA.
He died near Siena, Italy in a road accident in 1989 and was buried at Bunclody, County Wexford.
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