91
Virgin with the Child
The proposed painting denounces the typical characters of Domenico Piola's painting, identified by scholars as the most prestigious exponent of Genoese painting of the second half of the 17th century, at the head of a vast and prolific workshop that monopolized the market and the figurative results of Ligurian area (especially following the void left by the death of Valerio Castello in 1659).
The glimpse with which the Child is identified, with deep and elongated eyes, often recurs to identify a peculiar expressive figure of Piola's painting, as well as the hieratic and intimate attitude of the Virgin, in a wide pose, the absorbed and fleeting gaze. It is therefore good to remember how Domenico Piola in fact, in his path of stylistic maturation, managed to overcome the impetuousness, as strong as it is essential, of Rubens' painting through a cooling of the Flemish coloristic impetus, mindful of the lesson of Luca Cambiaso and not without of reflections deriving from the Lombard school.
Bibliography: Domenico Piola (1628-1703). Paths of Baroque painting, catalog of the exhibition curated by D. Sanguineti (Genoa, Palazzo Nicolosio Lomellino-Musei di Strada Nuova, 13 October 2017-7 January 2018)
cm 100x75