Giuseppe Bossi (11 August 1777 – 9 November 1815) was an Italian
painter, arts administrator and writer on art. He ranks among the foremost figures of
Neoclassical culture in Lombardy, along with
Ugo Foscolo
Ugo Foscolo (; 6 February 177810 September 1827), born Niccolò Foscolo, was an Italian writer, revolutionary and a poet.
He is especially remembered for his 1807 long poem ''Dei Sepolcri''.
Early life
Foscolo was born in Zakynthos in the Io ...
,
Giuseppe Parini
Giuseppe Parini (23 May 1729 – 15 August 1799) was an Italian enlightenment satirist and poet of the neoclassic period.
Biography
Parini (originally spelled Parino) was born in Bosisio (later renamed Bosisio Parini in his honour) in Brianza ...
,
Andrea Appiani
Andrea Appiani (31 May 17548 November 1817) was an Italian Neoclassicism, neoclassical painter.
Life
Born in Milan, it had been intended that he follow his father's career in medicine but instead entered the private academy of the painter Car ...
or
Manzoni.
Biography
He was born in the town of
Busto Arsizio
Busto Arsizio (; lmo, label= Bustocco, Büsti Grandi) is an Italian city and ''comune'' in the south-easternmost part of the Province of Varese, in the region of Lombardy, in Northern Italy, north of Milan. The economy of Busto Arsizio is main ...
, near
Milan
Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
. He was educated at the college of
Monza; and his early fondness for drawing was fostered by the director of the college. He then studied at the
Brera Academy of Fine Arts at Milan, and spent the years 1795–1801 in Rome, where he drew Roman remains and honed his skills in drawing anatomy at the morgue of a hospital and formed an intimate friendship with
Canova
Antonio Canova (; 1 November 1757 – 13 October 1822) was an Italian Neoclassical sculptor, famous for his marble sculptures. Often regarded as the greatest of the Neoclassical artists,. his sculpture was inspired by the Baroque and the cl ...
, who made a portrait bust of Boss
He met
Jacques-Louis David in Lyon in 1802, though his own style employed a less rigorously classicizing technique.
On his return to Milan he fell in with the circle of progressive young artists that formed the ''Cameretta Portiana''. He became assistant secretary, and then secretary (1802–1807) of the Brera Academy, whose collection of paintings, the ''Pinacoteca'' he essentially founded. In 1804, in conjunction with
Barnabo Oriani, he drew up revised organizational rules for the three academies of art of
Bologna
Bologna (, , ; egl, label=Emilian language, Emilian, Bulåggna ; lat, Bononia) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in Northern Italy. It is the seventh most populous city in Italy with about 400,000 inhabitants and 1 ...
,
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 bridges. The isla ...
and Milan, which lent weight to the need for public collections of great examples of the arts, which were being supplied from the dissolved monasteries and secularized churches of Lombardy, under Napoleonic administration. He was rewarded with the
Order of the Iron Crown
The Order of the Iron Crown ( it, link=no, Ordine della Corona Ferrea) was an order of merit that was established on 5 June 1805 in the Kingdom of Italy by Napoleon Bonaparte under his title of Napoleon I, King of Italy.
The order took its name ...
. On the occasion of the visit of
Napoleon
Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...
to Milan in 1805, Bossi exhibited at the Pinacoteca a drawing of the ''Last Judgment'' of
Michelangelo, and paintings representing Aurora and Night, Oedipus and Creon, and the Italian Parnassus.
By command of prince
Eugène de Beauharnais
Eugène Rose de Beauharnais, Duke of Leuchtenberg (; 3 September 1781 – 21 February 1824) was a French nobleman, statesman, and military commander who served during the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars.
Through the second marr ...
, viceroy of Italy, Bossi undertook to make a copy of ''
The Last Supper
Image:The Last Supper - Leonardo Da Vinci - High Resolution 32x16.jpg, 400px, alt=''The Last Supper'' by Leonardo da Vinci - Clickable Image, Depictions of the Last Supper in Christian art have been undertaken by artistic masters for centuries, ...
'' of
Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci (15 April 14522 May 1519) was an Italian polymath of the High Renaissance who was active as a painter, Drawing, draughtsman, engineer, scientist, theorist, sculptor, and architect. While his fame initially res ...
, then almost obliterated, for the purpose of getting it rendered in mosaic. The drawing was made from the remains of the original with the aid of copies and the best prints. The mosaic, 9.18 m in length, was executed by the Roman mosaicist
Giacomo Raffaelli, and was placed in the Minoritenkirche, Vienna. Bossi made another copy in oil, which was placed in the Pinacoteca Brera. The Brera Academy owed to him its fine collection of casts of great works of sculpture acquired at Paris, Rome and Florence. For himself, Bossi collected books, drawings, prints, paintings, coins, sculptures, and antiquities.
Bossi devoted a large part of his life to the study of the works of Leonardo, whose drawing manner he imitated accurately enough for his productions to have passed as Leonardos.
[Hans Ost, ''Das Leonardo-Portrat in der Kgl. Bibliothek Turin und andere Falschungen des Giuseppe Bossi'' (Gebr. Mann Studio-Reihe) 1980.] and his last work was a series of drawings in monochrome representing incidents in the life of that great master. He left unfinished a large cartoon in black chalk of the Dead Christ in the bosom of Mary, with John and the Magdalene. In 1810 he published a special work in large quarto, entitled ''Del Cenacolo di Leonardo da Vinci'', which had the merit of greatly interesting
Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German poet, playwright, novelist, scientist, statesman, theatre director, and critic. His works include plays, poetry, literature, and aesthetic criticism, as well as tr ...
, who shared Bossi's urgent dream of saving Leonardo's fresco.
Bossi's other publications were ''Delle Opinioni di Leonardo intorno alla simmetria de corpi umani'' (1811), and ''Del Tipo dell'arte della pittura'' (1816). His diary, 1807–1815, is a useful guide to the official artistic life of Napoleonic Milan.
Bossi died at his home in via S. Maria Valle,
Milan
Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...
. A monument by Canova was erected to his memory in the
Biblioteca Ambrosiana
The Biblioteca Ambrosiana is a historic library in Milan, Italy, also housing the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana, the Ambrosian art gallery. Named after Ambrose, the patron saint of Milan, it was founded in 1609 by Cardinal Federico Borromeo, whose agen ...
, and a bust was placed in the Brera.
Notes
References
*
Getty Museum: Giuseppe Bossi:a sheet of studies
Commemorative plaque on Bossi's Milan residence:gives birth date 11.viii.1777 and death date 9.xi.1815
Further reading
* (Chiara Nenci, editor), 2004. ''Le memorie di Giuseppe Bossi: Diario di un artista nella Milano napoleonica 1807-1815'' (Milan: Jaca Book)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bossi, Giuseppe
1777 births
1815 deaths
People from the Province of Varese
Italian art historians
18th-century Italian painters
Italian male painters
19th-century Italian painters
Italian neoclassical painters
Western Lombard language
Brera Academy alumni
Academic staff of Brera Academy
19th-century Italian male artists
18th-century Italian male artists