Pendant Still Lifes, Mid-1700s, Oil on Canvases, Set of 2

Pair of pendant Nature Morte from the mid-1700s.

Still life with bucchero, recorder, fruit, flowers, porcelain, biscuits and hanging sheets.

Still life with mandola, books, fruit, kitchen knife, oval basket and hanging papers.

The pendant portrays two tables set in an interior with a wooden wall in the background; on both tables, one square and one hexagonal, apparently chaotic compositions of objects are set up, but which together configure an orderly pyramidal geometry which in turn is crossed by a diagonal cut of light which clearly marks what is in light on the left side from what is in shadow on the right side.

On the square table we find food and domestic objects such as biscuits of different shapes, scattered fruit, a bowl and oriental porcelain cups placed in different positions. These are mixed with objects of luxury life such as the recorder broken down into three pieces, the musical score, the vase of cut flowers and the bucchero. On the walls of larch boards hang some sheets and an oval frame.

On the hexagonal table we see a twelve-stringed mandola, two lemons, one of which is cut in two, plums and cherries, some scattered and some contained within a wicker basket with a handle, three books bound in parchment (one of which precariously balanced on the edge of the table), a kitchen knife and a decorated oval basket. On the wall of larch boards, hanging from nails, we see a bunch of keys, some lunettes and two sheets of which one with a folded corner and a figure drawn in red chalk.

Both paintings use a perspective from above to better describe the set tables and both have the same clear diagonal cut of the light which helps to enhance the of the objects which, apart from the musical instruments, are all objects of domestic use which create a synthesis between the still lifes of the kitchen (pottery and food), those of the desk/study (books and notes) and the naturalistic ones (vase of flowers).

The elements of deceptive painting are also included in this fusion (the glasses that invite you to observe carefully and the keys mark the border between the world of reality and that of illusion).

The pair of paintings in question offers a series of interesting reflections that involve the vast production of still lifes that spread in Italy between 1600 and 1700. The first question I asked myself while observing them was related to their classification: are they still lifes or trompe l'oeil?

This indecision arises from the presence of the wooden wall in the background and from the many analogies with that vast production of illusory painting of the same era by the painters of fake boards; Francesco Raspis, Antonio Gianlisi, Andrea Remps, Sebastiano Lazzari and many others developed deception painting starting from the third quarter of 1600 according to Nordic imported models.

The wooden planks indicate the everyday life of the scene; but it is a scene within a scene, an illustration of what is really present in the environment in which the painting is placed. Even the use of the artificers, of the illusion, such as the corner table or the folds in the corners of the sheets or the inclined arrangement of the objects on the plane are all devices aimed at accentuating the depth of the scene.

The lunettes, keys and hanging sheets can be found in the majority of trompe l'oeil paintings of the period. I note that the writing on the left of the painting with the mandola 6.S6.90 placed in the background of the panels is absolutely original and, lacking any apparent meaning (perhaps deliberately enigmatic), seems to have a didactic purpose.

Having said this, it is my opinion that the author of the painting wanted to make his works current with the use of the fake background boards but that in reality his primary intent was to pay homage to the painting of Cristoforo Munari whose works the our painter was strongly inspired for the following reasons.

The Mexican bucchero depicted has strong consonances with the Munari painting exhibited at the National Gallery of Parma and with others present in Francesca Baldassarri's text. This clay container was used to perfume water and became highly appreciated by the Florentine court and nobility of the late 1600s, both for its exotic origin and for its usefulness. This interest in the charm of perfumes culminated at the end of the 17th century with the foundation of the Accademia degli Odorati Cavalieri.

In the same composition as the square table we find the white porcelain decorated with cobalt blue vegetal motifs favored by Munari; he arranged them in space almost constantly in pairs and in different positions (one standing and the other upside down). An expedient used by the artist to give depth to the scene.

Another frequent element from the first activity was in the use of the same musical instruments (the recorder and the mandola) which we find similarly depicted here.

Furthermore, in the composition on the square table we find a score with a non-musical writing exactly as found in the paintings of Munari, who evidently did not know music. The iconographic comparison leads with strong motivations to the works of Cristoforo Munari which our author reproduced according to a more cursive style in a subsequent period of approximately thirty years, after the master's death. Read the card

Bibliography:

Francesca Baldassari, Cristoforo Munari, Milan 1988;

Alberto Veca, Inganno e realtà, Bergamo 1980;

Aa.Vv., La natura morta in Italia, Milan 1989.


The paintings were selected from a private collection in Milan, they were in good condition, with an old lining and modern frames; we carried out a light cleaning and minimal pictorial touch-ups where necessary.