Pair of angels with floral festoon, Carlo Maratta (Camerano, 1625 – Rome, 1713) Workshop of

Pair of angels with floral festoon and cartouche with family motto 'Pulchriora latent'
Workshop of Carlo Maratta (Camerano, 1625 – Rome, 1713)

Dated on the parchment, right: 1697

oil on the table

The complete details of this work can be consulted directly from the following

This magnificent composition, depicting two small fluttering cupids intent on holding up a garland of flowers, can be traced back, both for its stylistic features and compositional taste, to a master active in the fervent seventeenth-century Baroque Rome.

One of the two cupids pleasantly prepares to grab the bow of the garland with his head turned downwards, while with his other hand he shows a parchment which bears, in addition to the date of execution, the Latin expression “Pulchriora latent” (“The more beautiful things are hidden"), which could conceivably recall the motto of the client family.

A second winged cherub, perched on a cloud, watches the scene holding the other end of the garland, richly decorated with various types of flowers, enriching the composition with a piece of still life of excellent quality.

The iconography featuring cherubs with flowers is frequent in the Baroque period, especially in the Roman context, congenial to the new bourgeois class, which desired more illusionistic and frivolous images for its residences, and therefore aspired to a typology of paintings with a strong decorative value , depicting riots of putti, angels or cherubs, and of which our table represents an emblematic example.

Going into the detail of the composition, its design invention, in addition to the stupendous luminous and chromatic effects, lead us to connect its authorship to the inventive flair of the workshop of Carlo Maratta (1625 – 1713). Note how the soft roundness of the playful cherubs, the brushstroke that defines the flowing hair and their soft complexions, are characteristic elements of his art.

In particular, it is useful to remember the series of paintings commissioned in 1692 by the banker Francesco Montioni for his palace in Rome (Opere di palazzo Montioni, Rome: link), and which Maratta himself executed with the collaboration of his pupil Franz Werner von Tamm (1658-1724). Again in collaboration with Tamm, Carlo Maratta repeated these compositions for the Marquis Nicolò Maria Pallavicini.

This still life iconography immediately found an echo among Roman collectors, and was therefore replicated and varied on numerous occasions. Among these the 'Garland of flowers with cupids' (Sotheby's, London, 6 July 1994, n. 115), finds correspondence with our painting:

A peculiarity that makes this work unique is that the panel is also painted on the back with two vertical ornaments with acanthus leaf motifs, which seem to be carved in 'trompe l'oeil' style. One might assume their original function as doors for a chamber organ.

Excellent state of conservation.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:

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