Adoration of Jesus Child Oil on Canvas Italy XVII Century

Oil on canvas. Venetian school of the eighteenth century. The portrait proposes the figure of a young woman wearing an everyday dress, but embellished with spotted fur edges; curiously, with the raised arm she flaunts a fur muff tucked over one hand, probably a habit to underline a fashion of the time. The painting shows signs of restoration, with conservation of the original canvas, although reassembled on a new frame. It is presented in a coeval oval frame, but surmounted by a wooden frieze added at a later time.

Oil painting on canvas. Central Italian school of the 17th century. According to the iconographic tradition, also in this painting the guardian angel is depicted as a winged young man who accompanies a child along a stretch of road, indicating the sky as the destination of the journey. The winged figure stands out and dominates the scene, lively in its colours, powerful in the physical strength it emanates, albeit sweet in its delicately protective attitude towards the child, whose small figure is enveloped in the limbs of its guardian. The scene is enclosed within a garland of bright and colorful flowers, which give color to the figures, otherwise placed in a dark and almost monochrome landscape. The depiction of characters, mainly religious, enclosed in floral frames had great development especially in Rome, linked to names such as Giovanni Stanchi (1608 -1675), rather than Mario Nuzzi known as Mario de' Fiori (1603 -1673), and others. The painting, restored and relined, is presented in a strip frame.

Oil painting on canvas. Venetian school of the late 18th century. The large painting tells the evangelical episode of the meeting between Saint Elizabeth, pregnant with John the Baptist, and Mary, waiting for Jesus, but inserted in a larger choral scene: it is placed on a large staircase, probably that of the temple in where Zechariah, Elizabeth's husband, was a priest, and a crowd of figures, and is animated by a crowd of figures, among which several women with children and families stand out. Detail in the foreground on the left is the figure with a little boy attached to his legs, who looks towards the viewer, indicating with a broad gesture of his arm the central event, the meeting between the two holy women. The colors stand out, which according to the Venetian pictorial tradition, are founding elements of the scenes, which underline the figures and fade into the different three-dimensional planes. Relined and restored, the canvas has a slight crack on the left. It is presented in a gilded frame from the late 19th century.

Oil painting on canvas. Central Italian school of the 17th century. In its pictorial style, the painting recalls the production of Angelo Caroselli (1585-1652), a Roman Baroque artist who was a painter, copyist, restorer, but also a pasticheur and connoisseur of art, i.e. creator of paintings "in the manner of"- in “technique” and in the “style” of a specific artistic period or of a specific author, even assembling “parts” taken from different paintings. Initially Caravaggesque, Il Caroselli later developed his own personal artistic language, which was copied by many minor artists. In this work the fixed and almost exasperated expressiveness of the character stands out, whose elegance of the seventeenth-century dress and the almost feminine features of the face with its rosy complexion contrast with the crudeness of Goliath's head, bloody, with the large stab wound that stands out against the mortal pallor. The painting has been restored and relined, retaining the original wooden frame. It is presented in a contemporary wooden frame.

Oil painting on canvas. Northern Italian school of the 17th century. The large painting presents as its subject a well-known Old Testament theme, the wealth of King Solomon, told in the First Book of Kings: "King Solomon surpassed, therefore, in wealth and wisdom, all the kings of the earth. In every part of the earth to approach Solomon to listen to the wisdom that God had placed in his heart. Everyone brought him, every year, offerings of silver and gold objects, clothes, weapons, spices, horses and mules". In the painting the king, richly dressed with the symbols of royalty (the crown, the scepter, the ermine cloak), listens standing to the postulants who come to him to receive the advice dictated by his proverbial wisdom, and in exchange they bring him offerings, which are commensurate with their social role: some farmers bring gifts of bags of grain, the fruits of their work in the fields, another raises a cup high, to attract the king's attention. The colors and pictorial style of the painting refer to the production of northern Italy, especially Venetian. The painting has been restored and relined.

Oil painting on canvas. The painting offers a half-length portrait of a young man who, in deshabillé, is lighting his pipe by drawing fire with a stick from the candle placed in front of him, on the table where a sword is also placed: perhaps it is a young knight in a moment of rest. It is precisely the candle, the only source of light in the scene, which suggests that the artist looked to the production of Georges De La Tour (1593 -1652), the French painter of the Caravaggio style who established himself for his "nocturnal" scenes, characterized by figures, usually low-ranking people rather than historical models or high-ranking figures, illuminated by the light of a candle, to create a special atmosphere of intimacy. The painting, restored and relined, is presented in a period frame.

Oil on canvas. Intense and high quality, the painting depicts a monarch of the royal house of Scotland. Around the portrait, in a painted oval frame, there are some writings: the name Rober(t) appears at the top left, the title Rex at the bottom left and the abbreviation Scot, which stands for Scotorum, on the right; the writing at the top right is not identifiable, but it seems to be an acronym. The man portrayed wears a hat and a coat adorned with ermine fur, which is considered the noblest fur, reserved for royalty. He wears a golden pendant around his neck, which depicts two leaves with the fruit of the thistle, which, in heraldry, symbolizes Scotland. The writing and the pendant therefore refer to a Robert of Scotland, probably from the dynasty that reigned in the fourteenth century. The portrait was however executed in the romantic nineteenth-century period, probably using some ancient engravings for inspiration. Restored and relined, it is presented in a frame in style.

Copy from Guido Reni

Oil painting on canvas. The work is one of the numerous replicas, with some variations, of the famous subject created by the famous Bolognese painter Guido Reni (1574 -1642) and his workshop. The composition, which sees the Virgin in prayer bent to adore the sleeping Child, is considered an invention of the brilliant vein of Reni, which, following the great success among collectors of the time, was then taken up by other authors of the seventeenth century, among which the name of Giovan Battista Salvi known as "Il Sassoferrato" stands out. The two most famous variants of this fascinating scene see the Virgin with her hands joined in prayer, adopted by Salvi, or the one with her hands on her chest, like this one, typically by Reni. Other variations concern the position of the head of the sleeping Christ Child, turned upwards as in this version, rather than reclining to one side; finally the background fabrics change. However, even in this replica the intensity of the scene stands out: it is transversely occupied by the body abandoned in repose of the child, where the divine nature is subject to the human one in sleep; above it, inclined in a protective and at the same time contemplative gesture, the body of Mary, which expresses all the maternal tenderness but also, in the gesture of the hands, the adoration of the incarnate mystery represented by the little son. The lively colors of the fabrics - the pillow on which Jesus is laid, the curtain behind it, the Mother's clothes - bring out the brightness of the flesh tones. Restored and relined, the painting is presented in a late 19th century frame.

Oil painting on canvas. The biblical episode depicted refers to the story of Daniel, the prophet in the court of King Darius the Mede who, for having prayed to his God, was condemned to be thrown into the lions' den. But God saved Daniel, sending an angel to close the jaws of the beasts, and the king pardoned Daniel by instead condemning those who had denounced him. The subject has been depicted several times in art, for the fascination linked to history but also for its exotic flavor due to the presence of wild beasts; in particular we remember the version by Rubens of 1615, where the prophet is depicted naked in the underground pit, while he prays ardently, surrounded by a crowd of ferocious lions. The work presented here instead proposes a version centered on the dialogue between the prophet and the angel, who face each other, standing out with the vivid colors of their robes against the dark background of a prison; there is only one lion, meekly crouching at the angel's feet, and therefore the spiritual and salvific dimension of the biblical event prevails. According to the famous art historian Maurizio Marini, a specialist in the painting of Caravaggio and Baroque art, who had had the opportunity to view the painting years ago, the work could be attributable to Antonio Maria Vassallo (1620 -1664) for the compositional and chromatic choices. The painting, restored and relined, is presented with a listello frame.

Oil painting on canvas. Italian school of the eighteenth century. In the portrait of this gentleman, the dressing gown made of an elegant floral fabric stands out in particular, in shades of brick red that recall the color of the wig. The severity of the pose and the austere gaze of the character almost contrast with the almost frivolous elegance of his clothing. The painting, restored and relined, is presented in a frame from the early 1900s.

Reduced version from an altarpiece by Girolamo Mazzola Bedoli

Oil painting on canvas. Venetian school of the seventeenth century. Entirely in the foreground, this scene of a group of sacred figures, which presents the faces of Mary and the Child Jesus in the centre, surrounded by the young San Giovanni in the lower left, and three angels forming a crown around. All the characters are happy and smiling, despite the reference to passion given by the stick surmounted by the Cross which John offers to Jesus. The movement of the bodies and the bright colors make the scene come alive. The painting is still on the first canvas, with no signs of previous restoration. There are several drops of color, spread above all along the lower margin and the two sides. It is presented in an antique lacquered wooden frame.

Oil painting on canvas. It is a vintage copy of the engraving of the same name made by Annibale Carracci (1560-1609), which had immediate success and gave rise to a series of printed replicas and painted copies. It presents the moment of the Passion in which Christ is crowned with the crown of thorns, the object of torture, the disparaging symbol of his proclamation as King of Kings. The act is performed by two figures, the Roman soldier and the Jew, representing the two people who they took part in Christ's death sentence. The figures, vigorous and sanguine, those of the two tormentors paler and more inert than the victim, create an intertwined composition of bodies, with that of the central Jesus joining the other two, uniting them in the shared responsibility of what they are doing; placed sideways, Jesus has his head bent forcibly to the left by the soldier who imposes the crown of thorns on him, while the Jew on the right places the bamboo cane in his hand, replacing the scepter. The scene is dominated by gloomy and dark colors, among which only the bright red of Christ's robe stands out, a symbol of his suffering humanity. The painting has been restored and relined. It is presented in a beautiful coeval frame, with shortcomings.