CARLO MANIERI
(Taranto ? - documented in Rome from 1662 to 1700)
Pair of Still Lifes
Oil on canvas, 62.5x83.5 cm
The identification of a small "corpus" of paintings attributable to our master has allowed studies in the still life genre to add a significant piece to the Roman artistic panorama of the second half of the 17th century; Manieri is documented with certainty in the Eternal City from 1662 and cultivates the "genre" with the expertise of a specialist, with evidently decorative aims, but also with compositional rigor and intelligence.
The canvases develop expressive modes already typical of a Michelangelo da Campidoglio in the compact arrangements of "still" objects, but also expand the visual field into wide landscape perspectives and pay attention to perspective and lighting on the support plane (note, incidentally, in the opening on the background, in the second canvas on the right, the mountainous profile reminiscent of Vesuvius).
The chromatic tones, not excessively bright, recall, in the almost autumnal accents, the chromatic taste of the Veneto, particularly in the foliage; the compositional density of fruits and vegetables further emphasizes the vivid volumetric quality of the surfaces sculpted by the light, which sometimes, as is evident in the peaches, also accentuates the tactile effect.
