Carlo Maratta (Camerano 1625 – Rome, 1713) Virgin with Child

Carlo Maratta (Camerano 1625 – Rome, 1713)
Virgin with Child

Late 17th – early 18th century

Oil painting on canvas
49 x 35 cm. – In frame 62 x 48 cm.

Provenance: Hampel Monaco, Sep. 28, 2023 (lot 265) link

The proposed work, depicting a Madonna with Child in a landscape view that opens from the window on the left, is to be attributed to the master Carlo Maratta, one of the greatest exponents of seventeenth-century classicism, or to an artist active in his flourishing workshop;

The composition presents a remarkable executive quality, and a style that manages to calibrate the taste of classicism with a Baroque free of excesses, two contrasting tendencies that thanks to Maratta were able to reconcile with surprising results. Even in its illustrative simplicity we see clearly highlighted the emotional and pictorial qualities of the master, who conceived specific Marian iconographies distinguished by an ideal of idealized beauty.

The canvas in question belongs to this peculiar collecting area and the prototype can be recognised in the canvas kept at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna and coming from the Albani collection, datable around 1660 (Link: https://catalogo.fondazionezeri.unibo.it/scheda/opera/51842/).

Thanks to the exceptional critical and collector success of his works, this one above all others, his creations constituted an absolute reference model, a paradigm of a pictorial style balanced in all its components (drawing, colour, composition, iconography), making him an undisputed point of reference for the Roman artistic scene, as well as a source of inspiration for European classicism.

A busy group of students and followers gravitated around the master, which makes it very difficult to distinguish, from an attribution point of view, the compositions replicated by the author from those entrusted to his students, especially those intended for easy diffusion and highly appreciated on the market, such as the beautiful Madonna in question.

See for example, always in the wake of the composition that we propose, the same Virgin and Child from a Roman Private Collection (Link: http://catalogo.fondazionezeri.unibo.it/scheda/opera/51751/), and also the Virgin and Child with two angels from the English collection of Stourhead House in Wiltshire (http://www.nationaltrustcollections.org.uk/object/732152), or the Madonna and Child with the Infant Saint John, which takes up the subject with some compositional variations from the National Museum of Fine Arts in Malta (Link: http://catalogo.fondazionezeri.unibo.it/entry/work/51220/)

Originally from Camerano, in the Marche region near Ancona, Carlo Maratti stood out for his precocious talent, soon moving to Rome to the workshop of Andrea Sacchi, where he studied all the greatest classicist artists, from Raphael to the Bolognese painters. However, he did not remain immune to the charm of Baroque art, which thanks to artists such as Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Giovanni Lanfranco and Pietro da Cortona, was experiencing its peak.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

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

We take care of and organize the transport of the purchased works, both for Italy and abroad, through professional and insured carriers.

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