Collection

Man and Woman from Castelpitzuto, Contado de Molise

Bartolomeo Pinelli

Basic information

ID: Г-IV-1718
Author: Bartolomeo Pinelli
Name: Man and Woman from Castelpitzuto, Contado de Molise
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 a son of the ceramist J. B. Pinelli. Bartolomeo Pinelli was born in 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 studio of Felice Giani, an Italian painter of the Neoclassic style, from whom he inherited the style of drawing. 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 Lviv's engravings are from this series. The main 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 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 first version of this composition by B. Pinelli 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 in Rome in 1814. The Lviv composition of 1816 is horizontal in contrast to the above-mentioned engraving in a square frame. In the foreground a young woman and a young man are talking. The woman is dressed in bright national clothing with a blue apron embroidered with gilded patterns, a blue waistcoat with cuffs trimmed with yellow ribbons, a headscarf on her head, and with solid dark shoes on her feet. She outstretched her hand to the young man, who was leaning on a long stick. The man is dressed in a long blue, red-rimmed camisole, put over a light vest, yellow underpants and white knee socks; on his head there is a wide-brimmed hat. The characters are painted with bright watercolor paints, with prevailing yellow, blue, red, and burgundy colors. In the background there is a mountain peak and a fragment of an urban development with a high tower on the right. It is apparently Castelpizzuto in a mountain valley in the heart of the Apennines between the modern provinces of Campania, Molise, and Lazio.

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 Uomo, e Donna di Castelpizuto, Provincia Contado de Molise. There is a number "18" in the upper right corner above the plate.

Man and Woman from Castelpitzuto, Contado de Molise

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