Giovanni Marghinotti

The most important work by Giovanni Marghinotti (Cagliari 1798-1865) is “Carlo Felice munific protector of Fine Arts in Sardinia”. Conceived and sketched in 1829, it is signed and dated 1830; its arrival is at the same time as the painter's transfer to Cagliari, in August 1933. During the same year, however, in the month of November, it was publicly exhibited at the Palazzo di Maria Cristina in Turin, and then found a definitive accommodation in 1834 in the Palazzo di Città in Cagliari.

The canvas, which is painted with oil paints and measures 300x550 cm, presents an allegorical composition in which King Carlo Felice, surrounded by the symbolic figures of his virtues (Peace, Justice, Religion, Faith, Meekness, Charity), welcomes and converses with the representations of the arts (Painting, Sculpture, Architecture) introduced by a winged genius, the emblem of Wisdom.

The work is of high quality both for the mastery with which the composition and organization of the space are solved - in fact, there are fourteen figures distributed in two main groups - and for the finesse of the forms, and for the sensitivity with which the looks and movements of the characters are played, from which feelings and thoughts shrivel covertly.

It is therefore evident not only the profound grip on Marghinotti of the eighteenth-century models in the simultaneous adherence to the purist results of neoclassicism, but also the meaning of the work, which, as the phase of art in Sardinia ends under the reign of Carlo Felice, will continue to spread its messages of adherence to the Restoration under that of Carlo Alberto.

Update

25/9/2023 - 16:13