Lot 427: ANDREA CASALI ROME 1705 - 1784

BACCHUS AND ARIADNE; ANGELICA AND MEDORO

measurements note
one: 36 3/4 by 29 in.; 93.3 by 73.7 cm.; the other: 36 1/4 by 28 in.; 92.1 by 71.1 cm.

a pair, both oil on canvas

Quantity: 2

PROVENANCE

Madame Maria Jeritza Seery, Newark, New Jersey;
By whom sold, New York, Sotheby's, June 11, 1981, lots 56 and 57 (as Noël Nicolas Coypel);
Anonymous sale, New York, Christie's, January 15, 1985, lot 79;
Anonymous sale, London, Christie's, July 9, 1993, lot 73;
Anonymous sale ("Property of a Private Collector, Sold Without Reserve"), New York, January 24, 2002, lot 29, there purchased by the present collector.

LITERATURE

G. Sestieri, Repertorio della Pittura Romana della Fine del Seicento e del Settecento, Turin 1993, vol. I, p. 44, vol. II, reproduced figures 222a-b.

NOTE

The subjects of this pair, one taken from Greek mythology and the other from an epic poem of the 16th century, are connected by their theme of impassioned love. Aridane, daughter of King Minos of Crete, having been abandoned by Theseus on the island of Naxos, was rescued by the god Bacchus who found her weeping. The two became lovers and Ovid (in Metamorphoses 8:176-182) tells how Bacchus took the crown from her head and flung in into the heavens where it became a constellation. The story of Angelica and Medoro is related by Ludovico Ariosto in Orlando Furioso, one of the greatest epic poems of the 16th century. The scene here depicted (Canto 19:36) shows the two lovers carving their intertwined intitials on trees and rocks throughout the forest.