PITTORE BOLOGNESE DEL XVII-XIX SECOLO

Studies of heads Oil on paper applied canvas, cm 44X29 (2) It is not easy to interpret these paintings, the generic name of Studies of heads is inaccurate and, in substance, misleading. The expressive force and at the same time the pictorial essentiality, suggest portraits of restlessness, of mental alienation. Perception, therefore, obliges a different reading, evading the idea that they are mere sketches and revealing a different genesis. It is therefore inevitable to remember the Portraits of the Blind, made by Annibale Carracci, works in which the painter infused an extraordinary humanity and the artistic motivation is bent by the concreteness of experience (see A. Ottani Cavina, Studi dal vero: i dipinti dei ciechi di Annibale Carracci, nella pittura emiliana del XVI e XVII secolo. Symposium, Bologna, 1987, pp. 89 ; 103). In our case, too, we see the same emotional participation, a sort of effort to understand the disease, the pain of living and, perhaps, to offer a possible solution of salvation.