1727 - UBALDO GANDOLFI

UBALDO GANDOLFI Head of a Pensive Old Man Oil on paper mounted on canvas, 37x25 cm; unframed. This previously unpublished, high-quality work belongs to the body of work by Ubaldo Gandolfi, one of the leading artists in the exploration of human psychology through painting. A leading figure in Bolognese painting from the 1660s until the early 1690s, Gandolfi was trained through the study of the school’s predecessors—namely the Carracci, Guido Reni, Guercino, Cavedoni, Albani, and Domenichino—among the greatest artists of the Italian 17th century. In this regard, he was inspired by the teachings of the Clementine Academy of Painting, Sculpture, and Architecture at the Institute of Sciences, where respect for tradition was emphasized while simultaneously fostering an understanding of the new ideas being discussed on the international stage. Ubaldo Gandolfi thus developed a style of painting grounded in the dual influence of the great local school’s models and a focus on the innovations taking place in international culture. Among the works that make up Ubaldo Gandolfi’s body of work are many beautiful character heads, or “arie di testa”—as they were called in that century—many of which were created for his friend and patron, Count Gregorio Casali Bentivoglio Paleotti. These works are the result not only of an excellent painterly style but also of the artist’s reflection on the fate of his fellow human beings. Unlike his contemporary painters—such as Rotari or Greuze himself—whose character heads are for the most part affable and intriguing figures designed to seduce, Gandolfi shuns primped young women, sexual innuendo, and facile concessions to affected taste: his studies from life respond, rather, to the need to restore to reality the expressive power and depth of great painting, reaffirming the value of an art that is conscious of its role in modern civilization. Such is the case with this image of an old man with his gaze cast downward and wrinkles etched across his face: the expression is the purest evidence of Ubaldo’s ability to bear witness to the depth of life. Several other studies from life, executed in oil on paper and similar to this one, are known to exist, attesting to the artist’s affinity for this technique. This work is accompanied by a study by Professor Donatella Biagi Maino, an excerpt of which is included here.