River landscape with common people and herds

Francesco Zuccarelli (Pitigliano, 1702 – Florence, 1788) This pleasant river landscape, enlivened by delightful genre figures, is the work of Francesco Zuccarelli (Pitigliano, 1702 – Florence, 1788), the artist who was one of the foremost interpreters of Arcadian and pastoral landscape in 18th-century Europe. In the painting, characterized by an airy vision of an idealized nature, the influence of Marco Ricci's art, with which Zuccarelli had become familiar in Florence around the end of the 1720s, is evident in the motifs of the leafy trees and the broad, expansive landscape view which, in the gentle recession of planes, perfectly balances the composition. Zuccarelli employs his usual iconographic repertoire of washerwomen and shepherds softly posed on the bank of a stream with cool waters. Leafy trees, rendered with airy brushstrokes, frame the rustic scene, while in the background, a small village with an ancient bell tower and gentle mountains are lightly silhouetted against a luminous sky fading from pearly gray to blue, traversed by light, rosy clouds. Oil on canvas, 40.5 x 54 cm - Expertise: Prof. Dario Succi