ALBANI FRANCESCO (1578 - 1660) Lot n° 43

ALBANI FRANCESCO (1578 - 1660) Scope of. Allegory of the Earth. Oil on canvas . Cm 135x135. The work is to be considered a derivation inspired by Francesco Albani's cycle of the elements, preserved at the Galleria Sabauda, Palazzo Reale, in Turin (inv. no. 479). The canvas proposed here is smaller in size (135 cm) than the one in Turin (180 cm).The series of the elements was commissioned by Cardinal Maurizio of Savoy after 1622, following a vision of the stories of Venus and Diana made by Albani for Scipione Borghese, with which he was fascinated.The four canvases arrived in Turin in 1633 and were initially placed in the Sala delle Rose at the Castello di Valentino, and were later transferred to the Palazzo Reale. Under Napoleon's rule they were taken to Paris in 1796 and then returned home in 1814, where they were placed in the Savoy Gallery. The cycle was very successful and Albani was praised by critics of the time for the way myth and nature are idealized in the works and for their aesthetic and decorative importance.