Tailors, hatters and hosiery menders, alongside glassblowers, puppeteers and musicians. But also hunchbacked servants who make a fine show alongside characters of the caliber of Pope Benedict XIV and Cardinal Silvio Valenti Gonzaga, immortalized in the famous painting by Giovanni Paolo Pannini.
The exhibited works come from various cultural institutions (Palazzo Chigi in Ariccia, the National Academy of San Luca, the Capitoline Historical Archive, the National Gallery of Ancient Art in Palazzo Barberini, the Central Institute for Graphics in Rome, the Museum of the Risorgimento in Rome and the of Art of the Cassa di Risparmio di Lucca Foundation) as well as by the Prints Department of Palazzo Braschi.
Long considered a minor genre, the caricature is nevertheless present in the production of many great artists, from Leonardo to Annibale Carracci, to Gian Lorenzo Bernini who in many respects is considered the true initiator of this peculiar type of irreverent portrait. But it was only in the eighteenth century that the art of caricature, an artistic form entrusted almost exclusively to drawing, began to establish itself, acquiring an increasingly intellectualistic approach.
As already in the previous century, caricature in Rome in the eighteenth century aimed to "strike" not the community but the individual character, as is evident in the prolific production of Pier Leone Ghezzi (1674-1755), the undisputed protagonist of this genre, nicknamed the "Knight of caricatures" for his ability to wittily portray the nature and customs of men from all walks of life.
Another magnificent interpreter was the papal architect Carlo Marchionni (1702-1786) who, with his good-natured pen, devoted himself to caricature for amusement and pleasure but with great graphic quality and depth of psychological insight. Even a pupil of his, Giuseppe Barberi (1746-1809), will assiduously cultivate this genre in parallel with his daily activity as an architect, depicting, in addition to the members of his own family, multiple characters including nobles, intellectuals, diplomats, collectors, prelates, craftsmen and street vendors .
With different styles, the three artists offer us a capillary and shrewd chronicle of their era not only through caricatures but also, and above all, with the handwritten annotations placed in the margins of the drawings, relating to the public and private life of the portrayed characters. A sort of "figurative diaries" which, with their micro-stories, give us an absolutely unusual and fascinating social cross-section.
The successful season of caricature in Rome ended with the end of the eighteenth century, gradually supplanted by the satirical cartoon as an illustration of a political press and an instrument of social criticism. Following the example of the first two French satirical journals La Caricature (1830-35) and Le Chiarivari (1832-93) – both founded in Paris by Charles Philipon and open to the collaboration of illustrators such as Honoré Daumier, Grandville, Paul Gavarni – in Rome many similar ones were born, among which the well-known Don Pirlone stands out. Socialist and anti-clerical in nature, it definitively abandons the indulgent tone of the eighteenth-century caricature for a much more immediate and incisive one, with strong civil commitment.
