All projects Galleria Borghese (Rome) beyond 60 works from Italian and foreign museums and important private collections which open a debate critical of an era where painting and sculpture competed, but also primordial materials, extracted from the mines to get up to artists' workshops and end up in collections. Works destined for palaces and villas increasingly rich in furnishings, examples for the production of luxury goods.
The path presents eight sections
The show begins with THE PAINTED STONE AND ITS INVENTOR which demonstrates how much the use of metals and marbles were supportive of painting and sculpture: works such as the Portrait of Roberto di Filippo Strozzi (1550 c.) of Francis Salviati, on African marble; that of Cosimo de Medici (1560 c.) attributed to Bronzino, on red porphyry; or again the Portrait of Pope Clement VII with a beard (1530 c.) of Sebastian del Piombo.
Sebastiano del Piombo, perhaps already before the Sack of Rome in 1527, developed the technique of oil painting on stone, aware of being resurrecting an ancient practice, mentioned by Pliny. The very invention of the stone painting.
It was the collection by Scipione Borghese in the first three decades of the seventeenth century that presented i examples of stone painting of considerable interest
In the AN ETERNAL DEVOTION LIKE MARBLE, we find works similar to talismans, to which a was sometimes attributed magical power of protection from physical and spiritual ills with incorruptible images of devotion part of the furnishings of the cardinals' bedrooms, such as theAdoration of the Magi (1605 – 1620) on alabaster of Antonio Tempesta or the Madonna and Child with Saint Francis (1605 c.) of Antonio Carracci painted on copper we find paintings on alabaster, blackboard, marble Carlo Saraceni, Orazio Gentileschi, Cavalier d'Arpino and many others.
In the STOP THE BEAUTY there are three female images by the Tuscan painter Leonardo Grace dedicated to Hebe, Lucretia e Cleopatra, made in the first half of the sixteenth century, executed on blackboard.
In the ANCIENT AND ALLEGORY, however, works on marble, blackboard and touchstone, all dedicated to themes of poetry such asAndromeda of the Cavalier d'Arpino e Hell with mythological episodes di Vincent Mannozzi.
The section A NIGHT AS BLACK AS STONE the paintings on dark stones (touchstone, slate or Belgian marble); while in sections PAINTING WITH STONE e PRECIOUS AND COLORED STONES, backdrops offered by the village stone and the preciousness of supports such as lapis lazuli.
To these objects, the section follows THE COLLECTION AND THE COLOR OF THE STONES, which introduces the presence of colored stones in the Roman aristocratic collections, among the objects currently part of the Borghese collection, the Table in semi-precious stones from the Roman area or the Tabernacle della Cappella, objects that belonged to the family such as the monumental cabinet conserved at Getty Museum and returned for the occasion to its places of origin.
Curiosities from the catalogue:
A night black as stone
various painters, Italians and foreigners, such as Hans Rottenhammer and Filippo Napoletano they used the dark color of blackboards and touchstones to dramatize the contrast with fires of fires or hellish scenes. These subjects, popularized by Flemish painters, but in particular by the German Adam Elsheimer who painted on copper, were particularly in vogue in Florence at the court of Cosimo II de' Medici, and in the case of Filippo Napoletano they must have certainly been inspired by the witchcraft scenes of Jacob van Swanenburg seen in Naples in his youth. Their vaguely disturbing atmosphere would have been accentuated by their being exhibited in series as in the case of theTrojan fire of Stefano della Bella and of theHell with mythological episodes by Vincenzo Mannozzi (exhibited in the last section). In Cerquozzi's painting, the polishing of the stone, performed by a specialist, is used to evoke the brilliance of the night sky when it is bathed in moonlight; Rottenhammer, through the stone support, alludes to various aspects of the story of Lot and his daughters, from their refuge in a cave, to the transformation of his wife into a statue of salt. Jacques Stella, who paints on all types of stone supports, creates a evocative nocturnal image of Judith, gathered in prayer before killing Holofernes. The glow of the painted candle illuminates it and makes the gold textures of the fabrics shine, while the mirrored surface of the stone reflects the real lights of the environment.
Curators: Francesca Cappelletti she has been director of the Galleria Borghese since November 2020.
He studied in Rome, La Sapienza University (1983-1987); in London, Warburg Institute (1989-1990), where she was later Frances Yates fellow (1995) and in Paris, Collège de France (1990-1991) and then taught History of Modern Art and History of Art of European Countries in Italian universities, most recently as a full professor at the University of Ferrara. Patricia Cavazzini he is Research Fellow at the British School at Rome, Advisor of the American Academy and member of the scientific committee of the Galleria Borghese. He received his doctorate in Renaissance and Baroque art history from Columbia University in New York, where he studied under Joseph Connors. His thesis on Palazzo Lancellotti ai Coronati, published by the Istituto Poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato in 1998, won the Saibene prize of the Longhi Foundation.
