LUCA GIORDANO
(Naples 1634 - 1705)
HOLY FAMILY... Lot 140
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LUCA GIORDANO
(Naples 1634 - 1705)
HOLY FAMILY WITH SAINT JOHNNY
Oil on canvas, cm. 97 x 74
PROVENANCE
Apulian family
The scene of the present composition is set outdoors in an imaginary rocky landscape that serves as the basis for the entire pictorial piece. The virgin, gently reclining on the rocks, holds the infant Jesus in her arms on the right, tenderly reaching out to clutch a small cross of woven reeds, toward St. John engaged in offering a wicker basket, filled with fruit. Below is the sheep's head and, in the background, in the left background, Joseph leaning on a stick.
The painting is placed chronologically by Nicola Spinosa, between the end of the sixth and the beginning of the seventh decade of the seventeenth century, when in Giordano's works the characteristics of Ribera's naturalism are blended with the coloristic achievements of Roman and Venetian painting, assimilated during his numerous travels after 1660.
The studied compositional balance of this intimate family scene and the careful formal description of each of the protagonists, with attention to the rendering of the forms, complexions and expressions of emotion reported on the features of the individuals, are recurring elements in other canvases of the same period by the Neapolitan painter, dating from the late 1660s and before Giordano's departure for Spain in 1692. All these works show clear signs of the artist's recent attention to the classicism of Pietro Berrettini, Andrea Sacchi, and Poussin in Rome. These classicist qualities persisted even in his compositions made after his move to the Spanish court in the service of Charles II of Habsburg, when Giordano reached the apogee of his classically mediated compositional solutions of restrained formal elegance and refined brilliance in the colors
CONDITION REPORT
Twentieth-century reintelo. Small spots of restoration under the face of St. Joseph and lower right above the sheep. The painting is in good condition
BIBLIOGRAPHY
N. Spinosa, Painting in Naples from Mattia Preti to Luca Giordano, Artem 2011
O. Ferrari, G. Scavizzi, Luca Giordano, The Complete Works, Electa, Naples 2000
CORNICE
Gilt and carved wooden frame with pods and battlements, 19th century (defects and missing)
This painting is accompanied by a report by Prof. Nicola Spinosa, dated May 2024
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