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拍品专文
This pair of architectural capricci date to the early career of Giovanni Paolo Panini. Born in Piacenza in 1691, Panini moved to Rome in 1711 and his admission to the Accademia di San Luca in late 1719 launched him into a busy and successful career. Panini won an important commission for a fresco cycle at Villa Patrizi which engaged him between 1719 and 1726 (now destroyed); other commissions included frescos for Palazzo de Carolis, Palazzo del Drago, and for the mezzanine of the Palazzo del Quirinale. Panini's output at this early stage also includes a landscape dated 1711 (Genoa, private collection; see Arisi, Giovanni Paolo Panini, 1986, p. 229, no. 25bis), some of the Patrizi gouaches (Rome, Marchese Patrizi collection; Arisi, nos. 117-8, receipt dated January 1715), a Triumphal arch with figures in Detroit (Detroit Institute of Art; Arisi, no. 123, probably acquired on a Grand Tour in 1717-19) and the work submitted for entrance to Accademia di San Luca (Rome, Accademia di San Luca; Arisi, no. 114, accepted in December 1719).
The distinctive clarity of drawing and the intense light found in the present capricci is also found in a pair of paintings previously in the collection of the Earl of Spencer at Althorp (Arisi, nos. 65-66). In both sets the artist pairs a dynamic scene - of figures running and playing among a sophisticated system of waterworks in a courtyard - with an idyllic one where figures peacefully go about their daily business. Arisi dates the ex-Althorp pictures to before 1719 and Brunetti proposes a date of 1720. Both point to the influence of Andrea Locatelli in those pictures - the characteristic interwoven tree trunks are a direct quote from Locatelli and they reappear in the present paintings. It is interesting to note that all four works share the same measurements, approximately 73 x 97 cm., a stock size used by Panini at this time (for other examples, see Arisi, nos. 61, 64 and 67).
Professor David R. Marshall has kindly confirmed the attribution, on the basis of photographs (private communication, 21 May 2013). He proposes a date between 1719 and 1722, and notes that given their level of sophistication (together with the ex-Althorp pair) relative to works documented to 1719 and earlier, and their relationship with the frescoes in the mezzanine of the Palazzo del Quirinale documented to late 1721, that the most likely date is towards the end of this period (i.e. circa 1722).
The distinctive clarity of drawing and the intense light found in the present capricci is also found in a pair of paintings previously in the collection of the Earl of Spencer at Althorp (Arisi, nos. 65-66). In both sets the artist pairs a dynamic scene - of figures running and playing among a sophisticated system of waterworks in a courtyard - with an idyllic one where figures peacefully go about their daily business. Arisi dates the ex-Althorp pictures to before 1719 and Brunetti proposes a date of 1720. Both point to the influence of Andrea Locatelli in those pictures - the characteristic interwoven tree trunks are a direct quote from Locatelli and they reappear in the present paintings. It is interesting to note that all four works share the same measurements, approximately 73 x 97 cm., a stock size used by Panini at this time (for other examples, see Arisi, nos. 61, 64 and 67).
Professor David R. Marshall has kindly confirmed the attribution, on the basis of photographs (private communication, 21 May 2013). He proposes a date between 1719 and 1722, and notes that given their level of sophistication (together with the ex-Althorp pair) relative to works documented to 1719 and earlier, and their relationship with the frescoes in the mezzanine of the Palazzo del Quirinale documented to late 1721, that the most likely date is towards the end of this period (i.e. circa 1722).