Lot 15: LOUIS DE CAULLERY CAMBRAI BEFORE 1582 - 1621 ANTWERP

ROME, A VIEW OF THE CASTEL SANT'ANGELO DURING THE 'GIRANDOLE' WITH ELEGANT FIGURES WATCHING AND PROMENADING IN THE FOREGROUND

ROME, A VIEW OF THE CASTEL SANT'ANGELO DURING THE 'GIRANDOLE' WITH ELEGANT FIGURES WATCHING AND PROMENADING IN THE FOREGROUND

measurements note
53.6 by 75.1 cm.; 21 1/8 by 29 5/8 in.

oil on panel

NOTE

This is one of only a small number of imaginary views of Rome painted by Louis de Caullery and an unusually early depiction of the Eternal City. The scene represents the fireworks (or 'girandole') from the Castel Sant'Angelo staged each year to celebrate Easter Monday and the feast of Saints Peter and Paul (on 29th June), which according to contemporary sources drew huge crowds of onlookers.

There is no evidence to suggest that De Caullery left Antwerp, where he entered into the guild of Saint Luke in 1593-94, to journey south to Italy, and it seems probable that his source for the present work was an engraving, one such as that inscribed and dated 'Ioannes Orlandi formis Roma 1602', which records the event from the same viewpoint and reveals a similar overall mise-en-scène (see J. Garms, Vedute di Roma. Dal Medioevo all'Ottocento, Naples 1995, vol. II, p. 56, no. B2, reproduced). A variant of the present work (on panel, 47.5 by 71 cm.) given to De Caullery, with a different disposition of the staffage in the foreground, was formerly with Galerie R. Finck, Brussels (see the exhibition catalogue, Le Siècle de Bruegel, Brussels, Musée des Beaux-Arts, 27 September - 24 November 1963, p. 78, no. 65, reproduced fig. 235).

De Caullery's early views of Rome link him with a small group of northern artists, such as Herman van Cleve and Jacob van Swanenburgh, who were among the first artists to make urban views a subject for depiction. Although De Caullery cannot be considered a vedutista in the purest sense, his interest in the depiction of cities and monuments as diverse as Antwerp, Venice, Rome and the Escorial, positions him as a forerunner to the likes of Gaspar van Wittel and the great vedutisti of the 18th century.