33,5x24cm
18th century, Emilian school
Portrait of a man with a book
Oil on canvas, 33,5 x 24 cm
With frame 51 x 62,5 cm
The stern awareness that shines through the eyes of the portrait, increased by the exceptional expressiveness that the artist of the painting was able to materialize, seems symptomatic of his wisdom, together with the attitude of dignified composure. The artist lingers on the thin wrinkles that crease his forehead, adding silent flashes to his beard and eyebrows. The character is dressed in a cloak arranged like a tunic, which reveals one shoulder; this foresight, combined with the book held in his hands and the morally upright appearance of the man, contribute to making his identification with an evangelist, a prophet or a holy scholar more likely, rather than a classic and generic reader.
The painting betrays stylistic features of the Romagna culture, underlining the polycentrism of the city of Bologna as well as the more widespread Emilian manner, which was able to gather in a new synthesis imported models such as the Marche style of Zuccari, in Emilia with some altarpieces, as well as the Romanisms of Cavalier d'Arpino when his Altarpiece of the Rosary passed through Cesena. The Emilian territory was also able to fruitfully welcome a more Venetian and Lombard formalism; the more Venetian imprint is revealed in the present painting through the comparisons that can be made with the production of the Emilian Gandolfi brothers, both returning from a stay in Veneto. Convincing in this regard are certain executions of the artist brothers, who when they moved away from the more constructed pomposity, were able to create paintings of notable psychological impact, indicators of the multifaceted Emilian culture. Ubaldo's Saint Joseph with Child (private collection), and Gaetano's canvases with Head of a Bearded Man (private collection), Allegory of Faith with the Trinity, Saint Peter and Saint Paul (church of S. Stefano, Bazzano), Holy Family (Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna), Institution of the Eucharist (church of S. Lorenzo, Budrio) and Saint Joseph (private collection, London) betray figurative subtleties that also recur in the present, through the anatomical study of the male characters, a sign of the common pool of interference. Ubaldo Gandolfi (San Matteo della Decima/Bologna, 1728 – Ravenna, 1781) made the journey to the lagoon in 1760, tying himself to the methods of Piazzetta; his brother Gaetano (San Matteo della Decima, 1734 – Bologna, 1802) trained at the Academy of Fine Arts in Bologna, joining his brother in 1760, studying the works of Tiepolo and other Venetians.
The same formal imprint, although less precise figuratively than the present one, especially in the capillary fidelity to the naturalism of the flesh tones which is truly exceptional in the painting in question, was by Giuseppe Marchesi known as Samson (Bologna, 1699 – ibid., 1771). Compare the male portraits contained in the Announcement of the Birth of the Virgin Mary (Montanari Fantini collection, Bologna, sketch for a mural painting), in the Archimede of the Pinacoteca Stuard and finally in the Deposition (private collection). Finally, we can appreciate an equal colouristic stamp in the Erminia and the Shepherds (Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna) by another protagonist of the first half of the eighteenth century in Bologna, Giovan Antonio Burrini (Bologna, 1656 – ibid., 1727). First rival of Sebastiano Ricci, the painter became acquainted with the art of Veronese and Tintoretto in Venice; upon returning to Bologna, he entered into close friendship with Giuseppe Maria Crespi.
The object is in good condition

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