Alberto Pisa, Charing Cross Bridge, London
Alberto Pisa (Ferrara 1864 – Florence 1930) Charing Cross Bridge, London, 1901 Oil on canvas, 87 x 122.5 cm Museum of the Nineteenth Century, inv. 590 Alberto Pisa, a Ferrara painter of the same generation as Previati and Mentessi, studied in Florence in contact with the milieu of the Macchiaioli, then moved to London where […]
Gaetano Previati, The Muses
Gaetano Previati (Ferrara 1852 – Lavagna 1920) The Muses, 1902 Oil on canvas, 33 x 92 cm Museo dell’Ottocento, inv. 8315 On the back: cartouche “The New York Cultural Center, 2 Columbus Circle, New York 10019” The painting first appeared in 1902-03 at the group exhibition at the Permanente in Milan, and was reproduced […]
Gaetano Previati, Paolo and Francesca
Gaetano Previati (Ferrara 1852 – Lavagna 1920) Paul and Francesca, 1909 Oil on canvas, 230 x 260 cm Museum of the Nineteenth Century, inv. 3 The story of the ill-fated lovers Paolo and Francesca, narrated by Dante in Canto V of theInferno, comes to Gaetano Previati’s attention from his late Romantic phase: he took […]
Gaetano Previati, The Assumption (Assunta)
Gaetano Previati (Ferrara 1852 – Lavagna 1920) The Assumption (Assumption), c. 1901-03 Oil on canvas, 105 x 87 cm Museum of the Nineteenth Century, inv. 5 Gaetano Previati’s pictorial research reflects the artistic culture at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, characterized by the tension between faith in scientific progress and an […]
Joseph Mentessi, Peace
Joseph Mentessi (Ferrara 1857 – Milan 1931) Peace, 1907 Oil on canvas, 164 x 135 cm Museum of the Nineteenth Century, inv. 37 In a field brightened by the early morning light, against the backdrop of a cemetery lake landscape with delicate pinkish shadows, a young woman dressed in white and with her head covered […]
Joseph Mentessi, Panem nostrum quotidianum
Joseph Mentessi (Ferrara 1857 – Milan 1931) Panem nostrum quotidianum, 1894-95 Oil on canvas, 107.5 x 115.5 cm Museum of the Nineteenth Century, inv. 50 The first Brera Triennale in 1891 marked the establishment of social themes in art. Ferrara painter Giuseppe Mentessi adhered to this poetics and remained faithful to it for the next […]
John Muzzioli, The Funeral of Britannicus.
John Muzzioli The Funeral of Britannicus, 1888 (Modena 1854 – 1894) Oil on canvas, 146 x 330 cm Museum of the Nineteenth Century, inv. 32 The last decades of the nineteenth century saw a renewal of traditional history painting: the most fashionable Italian artists treated genre scenes and literary themes in an increasingly fast and […]
Giovanni Pagliarini, Madonna and Child
John Pagliarini (Ferrara 1809 – 1878) Madonna and Child, 1854 Oil on canvas, 126.5 x 92.5 cm Museo dell’Ottocento, inv. 85 Giovanni Pagliarini was a major figure in mid-nineteenth-century Ferrara painting, able to combine an interest in the models of the past, particularly the sixteenth century, with the sobriety of Biedermeier culture, which arose […]
Gaetano Turchi, Torquato Tasso in Sant’Anna
Gaetano Turchi (Ferrara 1817 – Florence 1851) Torquato Tasso in Sant’Anna, 1838 Oil on canvas, 180 x 130 cm Museum of the Nineteenth Century, inv. 79 Between the end of the 1820s and the beginning of the following decade, the romantic myth of Torquato Tasso, a poet with a tragic existence, experienced widespread popularity […]