Ancient Painting Scene with a Concert Oil on Canvas XIX Century

Oil painting on canvas. Northern European school of the late 19th century. Unidentified signature lower right. The portrait presents a child in a maritime context: he is sitting on a rock on a beach, by the sea, he is dressed like a sailor and is holding a small toy sailing ship in his hand. The child is rather prim and serious. The painting has slight tears in the canvas and color stains. It is presented in an imposing late 19th century frame, with several missing and damaged plaster decorations.

Siege Scene

Oil on canvas. Outside the fortifications of a city, a commander, surrounded by his soldiers, is about to light the fuse of the cannon. The army defends the citadel outside the walls and the soldiers scan the horizon looking downwards: this leads us to place the scene on the fortifications of a city, in particular those of Genoa, that rise on the mountains behind it and from which the Genoese defended the city from attacks from the sea; the Genoa setting is also supported by the banner that flies over the walls, the Saint George Cross (red cross on a white background), flag of the Republic of Genoa. The shape of the armor, weapons and clothing would refer to the siege of Genoa in 1522. It is therefore the nineteenth-century representation of a historical episode, which is then part of that pictorial production widespread in Italy in the nineteenth century, inspired by the new historical novel popular in literature. On the back of the frame there is the name G. Boni, together with a number that refers to participation in an official exhibition. Giovanni Boni was a pupil of the Brera Academy, in particular a follower of Giuseppe Sogni, an artist who was among the first to favour historical painting in its innovative romantic declinations. Not much is known about Boni, neither from a biographical point of view nor from his production. Of his certain attribution we know only the Nude of Man (painted Academy) with which he won the first prize for the Scuola del Nudo in Brera in 1852. The piece expresses the figures and the pathos of the scene with expressive efficiency; the characters in the foreground are very well characterized in their poses, expressions, in the details of the clothes and weapons, while the other figures fade into the background, suggesting the presence of a large army. The painting, still on the first canvas, shows small widespread losses of colour. It is presented in a frame in style.

Oil on the table. The picturesque landscape has a wide path in the foreground on the right which winds between fronds and green meadows, where flocks graze; a small family of peasants passes along the path, all engaged in the transport of goods: even the girl carries a large bundle on her head, while the mother carries the basket with her newborn son in the same way! In the background, the plain extends wide to fade towards the distant hills and into the clear and rarefied sky, which gives off an almost pink light. The fir table of the painting has undergone restoration and parqueting. The work is presented in a mid-1900s frame.

Oil painting on canvas. North European school of the 19th century. The romantic taste pervades this nocturnal landscape, illuminated by the light of the full moon, barely veiled by scattered thin clouds; on the country path, which runs alongside the torrential course of a river, two figures of wayfarers can be glimpsed, a child holding a woman's hand. The painting is presented in a gilded frame from the end of the 19th century.

Vase, Roman excavations, 1860

Oil painting on canvas. Signed and dated lower left. Further signature, date and title on the back. On the frame there is a stamp from an important private collection. The work proposes a composition of an amphora and a painted ceramic plate, surrounded on the right by roses. Milanese painter and decorator, Luigi Scrosati initially attended the Brera Academy, which he soon abandoned to devote himself to numerous trips abroad, in particular to Paris. Already from the beginning of his activity, in the 40s, he worked as a painter of still lifes strongly influenced by French examples, in particular from the Lyon school. Alongside the easel and watercolor production, dominated by the specialization of still life of flowers, Scrosati was very active as an interior decorator, often engaged in team work alongside architects and project managers, but always with considerable autonomy and a characteristic style , substantially eclectic and aimed at a reinterpretation of the styles of the past. The debut in this area, towards the end of 1842, consists of a cycle of frescoes in the residence of San Fiorano (LO) owned by Giorgio Guido Pallavicino Trivulzio, for which Scrosati decorated a Gothic room, a Rococo living room and a small entrance compartment. His frescoes can be found in numerous villas in and around Milan, works in which Scrosati refers to the styles of the past, re-proposing eighteenth-century suggestions, but also of the Baroque. The decorations in the Dante's Cabinet first and then in other rooms in the Palazzo Poldi Pezzoli in Milan (now home to the Museum of the same name) were instead of neo-medieval taste, made with the Bertini team of which Scorsati was part. The disease that struck Scrosati in the lower limbs in 1857, making him ill, probably prevented him from continuing his activity as a decorator, forcing him to fall back on floral easel painting, which led him to produce still lifes of flowers, but also portraits or fake bas-reliefs with garlands of flowers or even interiors and genre scenes, in which he was influenced by the German and Viennese production of the Biedermeier type and the French one of the Lyon school. In 1862 Scrosati was commissioned to direct a new Ornato course at the Brera Academy, with particular reference to flower painting and relations with industry, a course set up by the Braidense institution to expand the already flourishing school of ornamental painting. The work is presented in a style frame.

Oil painting on canvas. Northern Italian school of the 18th century. According to the taste of the 18th century, the proposed landscape is dominated by the remains of an ancient temple, vestiges of past glories. All around there is a countryside with a stream, but fading in the distance towards the blue peaks of a mountain range. Restored and relined, the painting is presented in a period frame.

Oil painting on canvas. Northern Italian school of the 17th-18th centuries. The scene shows the clash between knights outside the walls of a besieged city, with the smoke of firearms invading the sky. Restored and relined, the painting is presented in an adapted antique frame. The scene shows the clash between knights outside the walls of a besieged city, with the smoke of firearms invading the sky. Restored and relined, the painting is presented in an adapted antique frame.

Oil painting on canvas. A delicate composition of flowers is placed inside a sort of wooden cradle, with mushrooms and fruit on the ground; the background is external, but poorly defined by various stains. The work, on the first canvas, is also presented in a beautiful frame from the early 18th century, in lime wood carved with a leafy wreath held together by ribbons, and gilded with gouache.

Oil painting on canvas. Aulus Vitellius Germanicus Augustus is one of the Eleven Roman Emperors who were portrayed half-length in a series created by Titian in 1536-40 for Frederick II, Duke of Mantua. Passed first to the English royal house and then to the Spanish court, the paintings were all destroyed in a catastrophic fire at the Royal Alcazar of Madrid in 1734 and are now known only from copies made by various Flemish engravers between the end of the 16th and beginning of the 17th century. Among these, we have received the engraving of the portrait of Vitellius made by Aegidius Sadeler (1570 -1629), compared to which our copy presents some small differences, as was usual when works by other great artists were copied. The emperor, characterized by a prominent nose, thin lips, plump cheeks and a double chin, holds the staff of command and wears armor with a red cloak over it. The painting has been restored and relined.

Oil painting on canvas. Northern European school of the 18th century. Caratacus was a Celtic king of the Catuvellauni tribe of Britons and leader of the anti-Roman resistance and famous as a freedom fighter. For eight years he resisted the Roman invasion of Britain starting in 43 AD. For eight years he was the most wanted man in the Roman Empire, hunted relentlessly, from fight to fight, from fortress to fortress, in the mountains of Wales, until he was not betrayed and handed over to the Romans in 51 AD by Cartimandua, queen of the Yorkshire Brigands, to whom he had turned for help. Defeated, he was brought in chains to Rome with his entire family: brought before the emperor, the British king spoke with such wisdom and pride (with the speech reported by Tacitus in his Annales) that Claudius, struck by his words, granted the grace to him, his wife and brothers, allowing them to spend the rest of their days in Rome. The painting presents the moment of Caratacus' peroration, at the center of the scene in chains, fervently pleading his case before the emperor: he is sitting on his throne, flanked by his wife and surrounded by senators and soldiers. The painting, restored and relined at the end of the 19th century, has slight damage.

Oil painting on canvas. The vertically developed landscape sees an imposing architectural structure in ruins at the centre, invaded by weeds and presented with nuanced colors and features, as if to underline its decadence. In front, in the foreground and well defined, some figures of shepherds at rest, while the cows graze: one shepherd plays the whistle, the second, sitting leaning on his stick, observes the third, who, having stripped naked, is intent on washing himself, stretched languidly on the edge of the waterhole. On the left there is a glimpse of rocky peaks, gray under a sky with dawn atmospheres. The restored and framed painting is presented with a strip frame.

Oil on canvas. 17th century Tuscan school. According to Christian tradition, Saint Veronica was the 'pious woman' who, seeing the passion of Jesus carrying the cross and his face smeared with sweat and blood, wiped it with a linen cloth, on which the imprint of Jesus' face would remain. This veil, also known as the Holy Shroud, thus became the iconographic sign of the saint. Veronica also appears in the centre of the painting, while two angels on the sides hold the linen on which Christ's face is imprinted, crowned with thorns; below it, a chalice symbolically collects the divine blood, while above the saint's theta the Holy Spirit hovers. Restored and re-framed, the painting is presented in a stylish frame.