''Portrait of Ferdinand IV'' is an 1759 painting by

Anton Raphael Mengs Anton Raphael Mengs (22 March 1728 – 29 June 1779) was a German people, German painter, active in Dresden, Rome, and Madrid, who while painting in the Rococo period of the mid-18th century became one of the precursors to Neoclassicism, Neoclas ...

, now in the

National Museum of Capodimonte Museo di Capodimonte is an art museum located in the Palace of Capodimonte, a grand House of Bourbon, Bourbon palazzo in Naples, Italy. The museum is the prime repository of Neapolitan painting and decorative art, with several important works ...

, in

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

Description

It depicts Ferdinand IV of the

Kingdom of Naples The Kingdom of Naples ( la, Regnum Neapolitanum; it, Regno di Napoli; nap, Regno 'e Napule), also known as the Kingdom of Sicily, was a state that ruled the part of the Italian Peninsula south of the Papal States between 1282 and 1816. It was ...

, later (after 1816) known as

Ferdinand I of the Two Sicilies Ferdinand I (12 January 1751 – 4 January 1825) was the King of the Two Sicilies from 1816, after his restoration following victory in the Napoleonic Wars. Before that he had been, since 1759, Ferdinand IV of the Kingdom of Naples and Ferdinand I ...

, and was commissioned by his mother

Maria Amalia of Saxony es, María Amalia Cristina Francisca Javiera Flora Walburga , spouse = Charles III of Spain , issue = , issue-link = #Issue , house = Wettin , father = Augustus III of Poland , mother = Maria Josepha of ...

to celebrate Ferdinand's accession to the throne of

aged eight after his father Charles of Bourbon's abdicated that throne to be king of Spain. This makes it the first official painting of the new king, produced by the artist in October 1759 in around a month, though it was critiqued by the other court artists

Luigi Vanvitelli Luigi Vanvitelli (; 12 May 1700 – 1 March 1773), known in Dutch as (), was an Italian architect and painter. The most prominent 18th-century architect of Italy, he practised a sober classicising academic Late Baroque style that made an eas ...

Giuseppe Bonito Giuseppe Bonito (11 January 1707 – 9 May 1789) was a Neapolitan painter of the Rococo period. Giuseppe Bonito is known for genre depictions on canvas. Many of Gaspare Traversi's paintings had previously been attributed to Bonito. Biograp ...

and

Francesco Liani Francesco Liani (c.1712 - 1780) was an Italian painter, mainly known for his portraits of the Neapolitan royal family. Born in Borgo San Donnino (now known as Fidenza), he moved to Naples in 1740 as part of the court of Charles of Bourbon (the fu ...

, who had been passed over for the commission. Mengs also produced in 1760 a second copy of the painting, which was sent to Ferdinand's parents in Madrid and which is now in the

Prado Museum The Prado Museum ( ; ), officially known as Museo Nacional del Prado, is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It is widely considered to house one of the world's finest collections of European art, dating from the ...

. Visually the main difference between the two paintings is the signature on 1760 copy, located on the square tile in bottom left corner.

Gallery

File:Napoli - Museo di Capodimonte (appartamento reale3).jpg, The painting displayed in the room 33 of the

Palace of Capodimonte The Royal Palace of Capodimonte ( it, Reggia di Capodimonte) is a large palazzo in Naples, Italy. It was formerly the summer residence and hunting lodge of the Bourbon kings of the Two Sicilies, one of the two royal palaces in Naples. Today, it c ...

. File:Ferdinand IV at age nine.jpg, The 1760 copy now in the

Museo del Prado The Prado Museum ( ; ), officially known as Museo Nacional del Prado, is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It is widely considered to house one of the world's finest collections of European art, dating from the ...

, Spain.

Sources

*http://cir.campania.beniculturali.it/museodicapodimonte/itinerari-tematici/galleria-di-immagini/OA900326 *Mario Sapio, Il Museo di Capodimonte, Napoli, Arte'm, 2012. *Touring Club Italiano, Museo di Capodimonte, Milano, Touring Club Editore, 2012.

References

1759 paintings Portraits by Anton Raphael Mengs Portraits of men Paintings in the Museo di Capodimonte Ferdinand I of the Two Sicilies {{18C-painting-stub