Circle of Pietro Neri Scacciati (Florence, 1684-1749)
Still life with courtyard and birds
Oil on canvas, 77.5 x 113 cm
With frame 98 x 123.5 cm
Starting from the 16th century, the central Italian pictorial school developed a particular predilection for a sincere still life painting that investigated with heartfelt vividness and naturalistic virtuosity those subjects traditionally established in the drawing repertoire; still lifes of animals preferentially featured creatures from the undergrowth, courtyard, and pastoral settings. The feverishly tactile workmanship of the pictorial material had encouraged an ever-increasing predilection for aligning with the trends then coming from the Flemish countries, which, combined with Van Dyckian suggestions, found fertile ground especially in the city of Genoa.
The present painting figures as a happy ornithological parenthesis, indicative of the artist's skillful perfectionism in specifically portraying each animal. A subtle pigmentation outlines the individual feathers of the birds with fine highlights, enlivened by an exceptionally brilliant and vivid eye. In addition to the domestic rooster at the center of the composition, whose breed is recognizable as the 'Livorno collo d'oro' (golden-necked Leghorn), with flaming wattles and a carnation-type comb, it is possible to distinguish a mallard duck - in the duck with a dark green head and white collar, as well as common hens, a black Padua hen in the specimen with a copious tuft mottled with white on the head and mottled feathers, and also pigeons of various subtypes on the right side of the painting.
Typological and design consonances allow us to approach the present artist to the circle of Pietro Neri Scacciati. Son of the flower painter Andrea, Pietro specialized in the portrait of animals; his still lifes, recently the subject of in-depth study by Simari, academically developed the paintings of Bartolomeo Bimbi, another well-known animalier. Scacciati knew how to combine the scientific acuteness with which he portrayed the animals, realistically drawn from living or, in the case of rare species, embalmed specimens, with a charming decorative purpose. This simultaneity of intentions is also evident in the present painting, in which it is also possible to observe that typical pyramidal mountain in the background, which constituted a signature image for Scacciati. In particular, compare the present painting with Courtyard Birds and Parrot in a Landscape (Museo della Natura Morta of the Medici Villa of Poggio a Caiano) by Scacciati, of evident figural assonances. Conceived as a pendant, the aforementioned painting was commissioned to Scacciati, most likely, by the Medici Grand Duke Gian Gastone himself, once the order by Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici was excluded for documentary reasons. Consider also Birds in a Landscape with Fountain from the same collection, always executed by Scacciati, with a compositional airiness equal to the present one.
The object is in good condition
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