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Head of an Old Man

Luca Giordano

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Basic information
ID
Ж-3781
Author
Luca Giordano
Name
Head of an Old Man
Country
Italy
Technique
oil painting
Material
canvas oil
Dimensions (height x width, cm)
61 x 45
Additionally
Type
painting
Genre
portraiture religious
Plot
Image of an Old Man
Provenance
Received from a private collection in Lviv, 1959
Exposition
Potocki Palace
Information about author
Author
Luca Giordano
Artist's lifetime
1634–1705
Country
Italy
Biography
Luca Giordano (1634–1705) was an Italian artist and representative of the Neapolitan school. He studied under Jose de Ribera and Pietro da Cortona, whose influences can be seen in the painter's early works. The artist travelled from Naples to Bologna, Paris, Florence, and Venice. In 1692, King Charles II invited Luca Giordano to Spain, where he worked in the Escorial, the Royal Palace, and the Church of St. Anthony in Madrid. Being one of the outstanding masters of the Baroque era, the artist developed a temperamental, decorative, and spectacular style of painting, which ensured his success with numerous customers in various places throughout Western Europe. The peculiarity of Luca Giordano's canvases was the combination of real and fantasy images, spatial freedom of composition, textural expressiveness, a broad brushstroke in the manner of alla prima, and unrestrained brightness or sienna-umber depth of colours. In the later period of his oeuvre, he developed a more decorative and light artistic language, later admired by Jean-Honoré Fragonard. It is no coincidence that Luca Giordano is called "proto-Tiepolo", given that the last one paved the way for rocaille painting in Italy. Hardworking and gifted with a rich imagination, the artist painted exceptionally quickly, which affected the quality of the works in many cases.
Object description
In the seventeenth century, new forms of depicting people appeared in Italian painting. These were small format works, often in series, representing saints, philosophers, or ordinary characters from daily life. The emphasis in such images was on portrait features, the reflection of characters and emotions. On the canvas, the artist depicts a grey-bearded man, his gaze directed upwards. Perhaps, this is a saint who looks up to heaven with reverence, worthy of emulation in virtue and faith. The artist was especially attentive in reproducing the realistic features of the saint's face. The portrait is a part of the "Philosophers" series. The stylistic ease and psychological nuances highlight the temperamental style of Luca Giordano.
Legal regulation
Borys Voznytskyi Lviv National Art Gallery

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