Ariadne on the island of Naxos, Guido Reni (Bologna, 1575 – Bologna, 1642) workshop of

Arianna on the island of Naxos

Workshop of Guido Reni (Bologna, 1575 – Bologna, 1642)
Attributable to Francesco Gessi (Bologna 1588 – 1649)

Oil painting on canvas

114 x 86 – in frame 128 x 105 cm.

The subject of the beautiful painting proposed is a comely young girl sitting on the rocks, mischievously undressed and with a sweetly absent-minded gaze, while in the background the intense blue of a crystalline sea, which highlights her sculptural body and embellishes the composition.

Although with variations, the invention of this fascinating image is taken from mythological iconography, and derives from a segment of the painting by Guido Reni depicting Bacchus and Ariadne, made around 1614 for the Bolognese collector Cesare Rinaldi (1559–1636), and then purchased by Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni for his Roman residence, and today kept at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (oil on canvas, 86 x 96 cm., museum URL: https://collections.lacma.org/node/242336)

The female figure is therefore to be identified with the beautiful Ariadne, daughter of the Cretan king Minos, who after falling in love with Theseus and helping him escape from the labyrinth of the monstrous Minotaur, was abandoned by the ungrateful hero on the island of Naxos, whose ships can be seen moving away on the horizon. According to the Greek Philostratus (Imagines, 1,15) the girl was however saved by the god Bacchus, who finding her sleeping on the shore, beautiful and completely naked, fell madly in love with her and asked her if she wanted to be his wife.

In the field of painting, the figure of Ariadne was often borrowed, especially starting from the Renaissance, with the pretext of staging the famous Greek myth but also as an allegory of profane love.

This is a very refined iconographic subject, inspired by cultured literary models and therefore appreciated by collectors of the time, who at the same time loved to decorate their homes with figures of graceful nudity.

The nudity is typically Renian – with those characteristics that would later become distinctive elements of Bolognese classicism – and tends to idealize the depicted subject, often making him assume classical poses, almost like an ancient statue, and ethereal expressions, like the young girl's candid face.

We are faced with a composition which, executed in the seventeenth century, can plausibly be attributed to the hand of a painter from Guido Reni's entourage, in particular Francesco Gessi (Bologna 1588 – 1649), one of his most faithful followers.

Among the first students to grow up in Guido Reni's workshop, he represented, together with Giovan Andrea Sirani, the continuity of his master's classicist tradition in the local context.

As can be seen in the proposed canvas, Gessi continued his style, bathing his works in a diffused light, highlighting the shapes and soft drapes, while the dreamy physiognomy and the delicate chromatic scale infuse the scene with an Arcadian and theatrical classicism.

Attending Guido's prestigious workshop for a decade, from 1614 to 1624, his first production was therefore inspired by the master, imitating his style with great attention and reproposing his most famous iconographies, as in this case, where we see a fragment of a more complex composition extracted.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

The painting is sold complete with a pleasant golden frame and is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity and descriptive iconographic card.

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