6608 - Caliari, Paolino

Caliari, Paolino Compositional studies of biblical scenes: God the Father in the clouds, angels, detailed studies of hands and feet. 18 drawings on 9 double-sided sheets, each in pen in brown or gray-brown, washed in brown or gray-brown, some over graphite. Each approx. 26 x 17.6 cm. (1818). Paolo Caliari was born in Verona in 1763, the son of Domenico Caliari, a bookseller and copperplate engraver, through whom he became familiar with the techniques of engraving at an early age. He studied at the local art academy under Prospero Schiavi (1730–1803), one of the academy’s co-founders and a student of Giambettino Cignaroli (1706–1770), and received his teaching certificate shortly after completing his studies in 1788. Early in his career, he won numerous academic awards for his work, was involved in several commissions to decorate palaces and homes in his city, and created occasional portraits as well as numerous altarpieces and devotional paintings. In addition, he devoted himself to experimenting with various artistic techniques and to studying and copying paintings by the Old Masters. The sheets are part of an album whose title bears the handwritten title “Schizzi a Primi colpi di Penna in otto Giorni 1818,” from which it follows that these drawings were also created in 1818 (see Bassenge, Auction 125 in May 2025, Lot 6769). The ten double-sided drawings were attributed to Paolo Caliari by Donatella Biagi Maino. The drawings depict various religious and allegorical subjects as well as individual studies of hands and feet. A single theme is often repeated with few variations and minor changes in order to arrive at a clear rendering of the subject. The sheets may have been either a private stylistic exercise by the artist or created for educational purposes to be used in classes at the Academy, where the artist served on the board of directors beginning in 1808. Provenance: Private collection, Rome. Lit.: Donatella di Biagi Maino: “Paolo Caliari o dell’Accademia. Un album di disegni ritrovato,” in: Studi in onore di Stefano Tumide, Bologna 2016, pp. 483–491. - Please request condition reports for the lots, as the condition is usually not specified in the catalog. - Please ask for condition reports for individual lots, as the condition is usually not mentioned in the catalog.