Lot 192: Pasquale Rossi, called Il Pasqualino , Vicenza 1641 - 1725 Rome Isaac blessing Jacob oil on copper

oil on copper

measurements note 39.5 by 34.5 cm.; 15 1/2 by 13 5/8 in.

R. Spear, Renaissance and baroque paintings from the Sciarra and Fiano collections, Rome 1972, p. 80, reproduced fig. 27.

Bought by the present owner in Autumn 1971.

THE PROPERTY OF A PRIVATE COLLECTOR
Richard Spear has noted that the treatment of the figures' anatomy and drapery in the present work, and the "ingenuous naïvété of the youthful characters", is very close to that in Pasqualino Rossi's Pietà in the Almagià Collection in Rome (see R. Spear, under literature, p. 80, cat. no. 41, reproduced).

Pasqualino Rossi, called Il Pasqualino, was trained by Pietro della Vecchia before moving to Rome, where he was to spend the remainder of his life, and where he specialised initially in domestic genre scenes. He was elected to the Congregazione dei Virtuosi del Pantheon and in 1670 he joined the Accademia di S. Luca. In addition to genre scenes he did carry out several important religious commissions, including two episodes from the life of St. Romuald for the church of S. Benedetto in Fabriano in 1674, and for the church of S. Lucia in Serra San Quirico he painted scenes from the life of St. Lucy. He is however best known for such lively genre scenes as the Sewing School (Paris, Louvre) and the Music School (formerly Florence, Bellini collection; see R. Pallucchini, La Pittura Veneziana del Seicento, vol. II, Milan 1981, pp. 874-5, reproduced figs. 977 and 979 respectively).