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Lot Essay
Some argue that Alberto Pasini was the most important and extensively traveled of all the Italian Orientalist painters. He enjoyed success both in his own country and in France, where he spent much of his time after 1851. Although educated at the Academy of Fine Arts in Parma, Alberto Pasini fled Italy and moved to Paris where he befriended other artists such as Eugéne Fromentin, Jules Dupré and Théodore Rousseau, all of whom influenced the development of Pasini's technique. In 1855, when Pasini was having financial difficulties, he joined a French expedition to the Near East where he discovered his personal style - and what would become his tour de force: Orientalism. Unlike many of his contemporaries who created their Orientalist paintings in Paris studios based on secondary accounts and arranged studio props, Pasini undertook numerous trips to the Middle East to experience first-hand these exotic lands.
His first excursion in 1855 sent him through Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, to the Persian Gulf and Teheran where he finally settled for over two years, taking commissions from the Shah. His introduction to the Near East came through the diplomat Prosper Bourée who asked Pasini in 1855 to accompany him on a mission to Persia, in place of the ailing Théodore Chassériau. At the conclusion of his duties with Bourée, Pasini spent fifty-two days traveling to Armenia, Turkey and subsequently Egypt. This expedition proved so inspirational for the Italian artist that he found revisiting the regions impossible to resist.
Pasini's Oriental scenes incorporate superb draghtsmanship and a great sensitivity to color and are remarkably similar in overall effect to those of Edwin Lord Weeks. His 'technical skill, sense of color harmony and excellent treatment of light make one regret that his delightful paintings are so rarely to be found' (L. Thornton, The Orientalist Painter-Travellers, Paris, 1994, p. 142).
In the present lot, it is apparent that Pasini was struck by the delicacy of the light in the East. His treatment of the play between shadow and the sun and his almost photographic representation of architecture and figures are a world apart from the imaginary exoticism of earlier Orientalist paintings. His juxtaposition of different social types brought together by the common bonds of trade and religion, his natural sense of composition and strong sense of realism, combine in the present work.
The artist has skillfully manipulated the composition by setting the architecture and a glimpse of the Bosphorus at an angle to the picture plane. The viewer's eye is drawn in by the bright red sails of the ship in the middle ground, while the colorful groupings of women draped in shades of red, yellow and blue juxtaposed with the cool earth tones of the architecture creates a sense of expansion and rhythm and firmly anchors the center of the composition. The experience of viewing the present work is similar to that of a curious traveler entering a foreign space, with all of the opulence and complexity of Constantinople punctuated with glimpses of everyday reality.
By 1870, Pasini's reputation as one of the greatest Orientalist painters was assured; he had won multiple gold medals, successfully exhibited at the Salon, participated in the Exposition universelle and the Venice Biennale, was awarded the Legion of Honor and the museum in Nantes acquired one of his works to display in their permanent collection.
His first excursion in 1855 sent him through Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, to the Persian Gulf and Teheran where he finally settled for over two years, taking commissions from the Shah. His introduction to the Near East came through the diplomat Prosper Bourée who asked Pasini in 1855 to accompany him on a mission to Persia, in place of the ailing Théodore Chassériau. At the conclusion of his duties with Bourée, Pasini spent fifty-two days traveling to Armenia, Turkey and subsequently Egypt. This expedition proved so inspirational for the Italian artist that he found revisiting the regions impossible to resist.
Pasini's Oriental scenes incorporate superb draghtsmanship and a great sensitivity to color and are remarkably similar in overall effect to those of Edwin Lord Weeks. His 'technical skill, sense of color harmony and excellent treatment of light make one regret that his delightful paintings are so rarely to be found' (L. Thornton, The Orientalist Painter-Travellers, Paris, 1994, p. 142).
In the present lot, it is apparent that Pasini was struck by the delicacy of the light in the East. His treatment of the play between shadow and the sun and his almost photographic representation of architecture and figures are a world apart from the imaginary exoticism of earlier Orientalist paintings. His juxtaposition of different social types brought together by the common bonds of trade and religion, his natural sense of composition and strong sense of realism, combine in the present work.
The artist has skillfully manipulated the composition by setting the architecture and a glimpse of the Bosphorus at an angle to the picture plane. The viewer's eye is drawn in by the bright red sails of the ship in the middle ground, while the colorful groupings of women draped in shades of red, yellow and blue juxtaposed with the cool earth tones of the architecture creates a sense of expansion and rhythm and firmly anchors the center of the composition. The experience of viewing the present work is similar to that of a curious traveler entering a foreign space, with all of the opulence and complexity of Constantinople punctuated with glimpses of everyday reality.
By 1870, Pasini's reputation as one of the greatest Orientalist painters was assured; he had won multiple gold medals, successfully exhibited at the Salon, participated in the Exposition universelle and the Venice Biennale, was awarded the Legion of Honor and the museum in Nantes acquired one of his works to display in their permanent collection.