Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini (29 April 1675 – 2 November 1741) was one of the leading Venetian
history painters
History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as well ...
of the early 18th century. His style melded the
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history marking the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity and covering the 15th and 16th centuries, characterized by an effort to revive and surpass ideas ...
style of
Paolo Veronese
Paolo Caliari (152819 April 1588), known as Paolo Veronese ( , also , ), was an Italian Renaissance painter based in Venice, known for extremely large history paintings of religion and mythology, such as ''The Wedding at Cana'' (1563) and ''The ...
with the
Baroque
The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...
of
Pietro da Cortona
Pietro da Cortona (; 1 November 1596 or 159716 May 1669) was an Italian Baroque painter and architect. Along with his contemporaries and rivals Gian Lorenzo Bernini and Francesco Borromini, he was one of the key figures in the emergence of Roman ...
and
Luca Giordano
Luca Giordano (18 October 1634 – 3 January 1705) was an Italian late-Baroque painter and printmaker in etching. Fluent and decorative, he worked successfully in Naples and Rome, Florence, and Venice, before spending a decade in Spain.
Ear ...
. He travelled widely on commissions which brought him to England, the
Southern Netherlands
The Southern Netherlands, also called the Catholic Netherlands, were the parts of the Low Countries belonging to the Holy Roman Empire which were at first largely controlled by Habsburg Spain (Spanish Netherlands, 1556–1714) and later by the A ...
, the
Dutch Republic
The United Provinces of the Netherlands, also known as the (Seven) United Provinces, officially as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands (Dutch: ''Republiek der Zeven Verenigde Nederlanden''), and commonly referred to in historiography ...
, Germany, Austria and France.
[Bernard Aikema. "Pellegrini, Giovanni Antonio." Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online. Oxford University Press. Web. 9 Mar. 2016.] He is considered an important predecessor of
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo
Giovanni Battista Tiepolo ( , ; March 5, 1696 – March 27, 1770), also known as Giambattista (or Gianbattista) Tiepolo, was an Italian painter and printmaker from the Republic of Venice who painted in the Rococo style, considered an impo ...
. One of his pupils was
Antonio Visentini
View of Piazza San Marco in Venice, by Antonio Visentini (1742).
Antonio Visentini (21 November 1688 – 26 June 1782) was an Italian architectural designer, painter and engraver, known for his architectural fantasies and ''capricci'', t ...
.
Life
Pellegrini was born in Venice. His father, also called Antonio, was a
shoemaker
Shoemaking is the process of making footwear.
Originally, shoes were made one at a time by hand, often by groups of shoemakers, or cobblers (also known as '' cordwainers''). In the 18th century, dozens or even hundreds of masters, journeymen ...
from
Padua
Padua ( ; it, Padova ; vec, Pàdova) is a city and ''comune'' in Veneto, northern Italy. Padua is on the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice. It is the capital of the province of Padua. It is also the economic and communications hub of the ...
. Pellegrini was a pupil of the Milanese painter
Paolo Pagani
Paolo Pagani (22 September 1655 – 5 May 1716) also known as Paolo Antonio Pagani or Paolo Pagano, was an Italian Baroque/ Mannerism painter of the 17th century.
Biography
Pagani was born in Valsolda, now a municipality in the Province of ...
. He travelled with his master to Moravia and Vienna in 1690 and was back in Venice in 1696 where he painted his first surviving works. The work of fellow Venetian
Sebastiano Ricci
Sebastiano Ricci (1 August 165915 May 1734) was an Italian painter of the late Baroque school of Venice. About the same age as Piazzetta, and an elder contemporary of Tiepolo, he represents a late version of the vigorous and luminous Cortonesqu ...
had an important influence on his work. He was in Rome from 1699 to 1701.
[ He married Angela Carriera, the sister of ]Rosalba Carriera
Rosalba Carriera (12 January 1673 – 15 April 1757) was a Venetian Rococo painter. In her younger years, she specialized in portrait miniatures. Carriera would later become known for her pastel portraits, helping popularize the medium in eighte ...
, in c.1704. Pellegrini decorated the dome above the staircase at the Scuola Grande di San Rocco
The Scuola Grande di San Rocco is a building in Venice, northern Italy. It is noted for its collection of paintings by Tintoretto and generally agreed to include some of his finest work.
History
The building is the seat of a confraternity establ ...
in 1709.
Pellegrini visited England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
from 1708 to 1713 at the invitation of the Earl of Manchester
Duke of Manchester is a title in the Peerage of Great Britain, and the current senior title of the House of Montagu. It was created in 1719 for the politician Charles Montagu, 4th Earl of Manchester. Manchester Parish in Jamaica was named afte ...
. Here he achieved considerable success. He painted murals in a number of English country house
An English country house is a large house or mansion in the English countryside. Such houses were often owned by individuals who also owned a town house. This allowed them to spend time in the country and in the city—hence, for these peopl ...
s, including at Kimbolton Castle
Kimbolton Castle is a country house in Kimbolton, Cambridgeshire, England. It was the final home of King Henry VIII's first wife, Catherine of Aragon. Originally a medieval castle but converted into a stately palace, it was the family seat of t ...
for the Earl of Manchester, Castle Howard
Castle Howard is a stately home in North Yorkshire, England, within the civil parish of Henderskelfe, located north of York. It is a private residence and has been the home of the Carlisle branch of the Howard family for more than 300 years. ...
(where his work was mostly destroyed by a fire in 1940), and Narford Hall
Narford is situated in the Breckland District of Norfolk and covers an area of 970 hectares (3.75 square miles).
Narford village has all but disappeared, with a population of only 41. At the 2011 Census the population of the area remained less t ...
, Norfolk, for Sir Andrew Fontaine. Michael Levey
Sir Michael Vincent Levey, LVO, FBA, FRSL (8 June 1927 – 28 December 2008) was a British art historian and was the director of the National Gallery from 1973 to 1986.
Biography
Levey was born in Wimbledon, London, and grew up in Leigh-on-Sea ...
, describing Pellegrini's paintings on the staircase at Kimbolton, says that, although painted directly into the wall in oil, "they have all the spontaneity and lightness of fresco
Fresco (plural ''frescos'' or ''frescoes'') is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaste ...
.[Levey 1980, p.50] In London he worked at 31 St James's Square for the Duke of Portland, where George Vertue
George Vertue (1684 – 24 July 1756) was an English engraver and antiquary, whose notebooks on British art of the first half of the 18th century are a valuable source for the period.
Life
Vertue was born in 1684 in St Martin-in-the-Fields, ...
noted in his notebooks "the hall and Staircase and one or two of the great rooms".
He became a director of Sir Godfrey Kneller
Sir Godfrey Kneller, 1st Baronet (born Gottfried Kniller; 8 August 1646 – 19 October 1723), was the leading portrait painter in England during the late 17th and early 18th centuries, and was court painter to English and British monarchs from ...
's Academy in London in 1711. He submitted designs for decorating the interior dome of the new St Paul's Cathedral
St Paul's Cathedral is an Anglican cathedral in London and is the seat of the Bishop of London. The cathedral serves as the mother church of the Diocese of London. It is on Ludgate Hill at the highest point of the City of London and is a Grad ...
, and is said to have been Christopher Wren
Sir Christopher Wren PRS FRS (; – ) was one of the most highly acclaimed English architects in history, as well as an anatomist, astronomer, geometer, and mathematician-physicist. He was accorded responsibility for rebuilding 52 churches ...
's favourite painter. He did not win the commission, losing out to Sir James Thornhill
Sir James Thornhill (25 July 1675 or 1676 – 4 May 1734) was an English painter of historical subjects working in the Italian baroque tradition. He was responsible for some large-scale schemes of murals, including the "Painted Hall" at the Ro ...
.
Pellegrini subsequently travelled through Germany and the Netherlands, collecting Northern paintings as he went and completing works in many European cities. In 1713-4 he was in Düsseldorf, where he painted a series of allegorical scenes of the life of the elector, Johann Wilhelm. He decorated the Golden Room in the Mauritshuis
The Mauritshuis (; en, Maurice House) is an art museum in The Hague, Netherlands. The museum houses the Royal Cabinet of Paintings which consists of 854 objects, mostly Dutch Golden Age paintings. The collection contains works by Johannes Vermeer ...
in The Hague
The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a city and municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's administrative centre and its seat of government, and while the official capital of ...
, and carried out other decorative schemes in Prague
Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...
, Dresden
Dresden (, ; Upper Saxon: ''Dräsdn''; wen, label=Upper Sorbian, Drježdźany) is the capital city of the German state of Saxony and its second most populous city, after Leipzig. It is the 12th most populous city of Germany, the fourth larg ...
and Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
. He returned to England in 1719, but was less successful on his second visit, mainly due to competition from other Venetian painters, including Sebastiano Ricci
Sebastiano Ricci (1 August 165915 May 1734) was an Italian painter of the late Baroque school of Venice. About the same age as Piazzetta, and an elder contemporary of Tiepolo, he represents a late version of the vigorous and luminous Cortonesqu ...
.
In about 1720 he painted the ceiling of John Law
John Law may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* John Law (artist) (born 1958), American artist
* John Law (comics), comic-book character created by Will Eisner
* John Law (film director), Hong Kong film director
* John Law (musician) (born 1961) ...
's Bank of France
The Bank of France ( French: ''Banque de France''), headquartered in Paris, is the central bank of France. Founded in 1800, it began as a private institution for managing state debts and issuing notes. It is responsible for the accounts of the F ...
in Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
(since destroyed).[C. Garas, "Le plafond de la Banque Royale de Giovanni Antonio Pellegrini", ''Bulletin du Musée Hongrois des Beaux-Arts'', 1962.]
Notes
Sources
*
Further reading
*Edward Croft-Murray
Major Edward Croft-Murray (1 September 1907 – 18 September 1980) was a British antiquarian, an expert on British art, and Keeper of the Department of Prints and Drawings at the British Museum from 1954 to 1973.
He was educated at Lancing Co ...
, ''Decorative Painting in England 1530-1837'', 2 vols. London 1962, 1971.
External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Pellegrini, Giovanni Antonio
1675 births
1741 deaths
17th-century Italian painters
Italian male painters
18th-century Italian painters
Painters from Venice
Italian Baroque painters
18th-century Italian male artists