Architectural View With Arches, Sculptures And Fountains, Vedutist Painter

Vedutist painter active in Rome in the eighteenth century
by Giovanni Battista Piranesi (Mogliano Veneto, 1720 - Rome, 1778)
Fancy architectural view with arches, sculptures and fountains

Oil on canvas (79 x 64 cm. -Framed 96 x 80 cm.)

The fascinating composition we are pleased to show you is taken from an invention made around 1740 in Rome by the engraver Giovanni Battista Piranesi (Mogliano Veneto, 1720 - Rome, 1778), now in the Metropolitan Museum in New York [1].

The print, entitled 'Group of Columns, holding two arches of a large courtyard. Below the pedestals of the Columns are decorated with magnificent groups of Fountains, and stairs leading to a Doric Atrium, adorned with Statues, Bas-reliefs, with other stairs necessary to ascend to the Apartments', is taken from the collection 'Architectures and Perspectives', which included 135 views of Rome. Roman antiquities and ancient remains were described with archaeological attention, but interpreted through the lens of a grandiose monumentality; the space is dominated by the imposing ruins of ancient buildings over which nature seems to have taken over.

They were originally created as a kind of souvenir, intended especially for British travellers whose visits to Rome were to be the culmination of the Grand Tour.

The view conceived by Piranesi from an imaginary perspective depicts an imposing palace; from the portico with majestic columns, the perspective viewpoint opens onto the foreground on the left with a fountain and a wide staircase.

The views of Rome executed by Giovanni Battista Piranesi marked an epoch, their dissemination contributed to the image and magnificence of the eternal city, and his plates were not only tools for study and documentation, but also food for thought on history and aesthetics.

Arriving from Venice in 1740, Giovanni Battista Piranesi travelled to the Eternal City with the gaze of an architect, a scenographer, a connoisseur of Roman history, an artist educated in the perspective rigour of Venetian vedutismo and, finally, a visionary: a utopian fabricator who, recovering ancient forms through the excellence of engraving technique, became an eloquent spokesman for Romanity and its resurrection in a new world.

The author of our painting, which represents a transposition on canvas of his famous creation, is certainly a worthy painter active in Rome in the second half of the 18th century, very probably close to Piranesi himself.

Among the most likely names we can naturally mention Jacopo Fabris (Venice 1689 - Copenhagen 1761) or Antonio Joli (Modena 1700 - Naples 1777). By Fabris we can mention, by way of comparison, the Capriccio architettonico con rovine classiche e figure (private collection) or the Decorazione carceraria con prigionieri e carceri (Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen). Photos 1 and 2.

Another name very close to our painting in terms of style and compositional choices is the Frenchman Charles-Louis Clérisseau (Paris, 1721 - Neuilly-Auteuil-Passy, 1820), a great admirer of ancient monumental architecture, which he got to know and study in Rome. Peculiar in his painting is the careful archaeological reading and the evident influence of Piranesi, of whom he was also a friend as well as a collaborator.

[1] Metropolitan Museum Link https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/365465