Collection

Woman from Brienza in the Province of Salerno in the Kingdom of Naples

Bartolomeo Pinelli

Basic information

ID: Г-IV-1700
Author: Bartolomeo Pinelli
Name: Woman from Brienza in the Province of Salerno in the Kingdom of Naples
Date of creation: 1816
Technique: etching watercolor
Material: paper
Dimensions (height x width, cm): 10 x 16

Additionally

Type: graphic art
Genre: genre art
Provenance: Collection of Faina Tarashchanska (Lviv), 1966

Information about author

Author: Bartolomeo Pinelli
Artist's lifetime: 1781–1835
Biography: Bartolomeo Pinelli (1781, Rome – 1835, ibid.) was an Italian painter, engraver, and sculptor. He was the son of the ceramist G. B. Pinelli. Bartolomeo Pinelli was born in the Trastevere district (over the River Tiber). Street sketches of that western suburb of Rome repeatedly appeared in his graphic works later. He studied in Bologna, later on – at Accademia di San Luca (Academy of Saint Luke) in Rome. He attended the Academy of Felice Giani, an Italian painter of the Neoclassic style, from whom he inherited the drawing style. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, Bartolomeo Pinelli took an interest in the engravings of the Renaissance, namely in the works by Marcantonio Raimondi, and started making etchings and lithographs out of his drawings. In 1809, Pinelli created his first series of watercolor etchings – Collection of 50 picturesque costumes (Raccola di cinquanta costumi pittoreschi). The album was reissued in 1814 and 1815. In 1816, a new version of the album under the title Nuova Raccolta di Cinquanta costumi pittoreschi incisi di acqua forte was released. Most of the Lviv engravings are from this series. The central theme of the artist's creative work is genre scenes (Costumi), which he saw in Rome, Naples, as well as the provinces of Abruzzo and Molise. Pinelli's engravings have not only artistic value but also carry important ethnographic information. In the 1820s and 1830s, the artist created drawings and engravings for poems by Torquato Tasso (1827–1829) and the novel “Don Quixote” (1834) by Miguel de Cervantes. One of Pinelli's famous series of drawings is Seven Hills of Rome (Sette colli di Roma) (1827–1830). The artist's works are housed in many Italian museums as well as in collections of other countries.

Object description

The composition is known only in one version of 1816, which was issued in the album Raccolta di 50 costumi li più interessanti delle città, terre e paesi in provincie diverse del Regno di Napoli (Collection of 50 most interesting picturesque costumes from cities, towns and villages of different provinces of the Kingdom of Naples) published by Giovanni Scudellari in Rome in 1817. The artist depicts a young woman in a luxurious national dress, with an apron embroidered with gold threads, dressed over a white shirt and blue skirt. The woman is holding the hand of a little girl, with the other hand she is leaning on a stick; there is a basket over her shoulder. The travelers are walking along the mountain path. In the background there is a mountain range, under which one can see the citadel of a small town. This is Brienza, one of the mountain towns of the Southern Italian province of Basilicata, which in the nineteenth century was a part of the province of Salerno. The travelers' clothing is painted with blue, red, and yellow watercolors. The trees are painted with green colors.

Inscriptions

In the lower left corner there is the author’s signature – Pinelli, date – 1816 and the place of performance – Roma. In the center of the engraving under the image there is the work’s title Donna di Brienza, della Provincia di Salerno, nel Regno di Napoli. There is a number "2" in the upper right corner above the image.

Woman from Brienza in the Province of Salerno in the Kingdom of Naples

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