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Lot Essay
A painter of stage sets and perspective views, Basoli was the son of a Bolognese artist who worked with his brothers Luigi and Francesco. After he spent a short time at the Italian Theatre, in Saint Petersburg, where he specialised in perspective and set designs, he published his Raccolta di cinquanta scene teatrali in 1810, and the Collezione di varie scene teatrali in 1821.
The present work does not relate to any set design, and according to the inscription was playfully drawn by Basoli in front of his friends, on the spot, with the purpose to amuse them, creating this imaginary view of the interior of an Egyptian temple from two accidental ink blots. Two signed drawings by Basoli executed in a similar technique are in the National Gallery of Art, Washington (inv. 1994.9.3, 1994.9.4; ). The main source on the artist remains his autobiography Catalogo delle opere di Antonio Basoli scritto da lui medesimo l’anno 1821, a manuscript preserved at the Accademia Clementina in Bologna (P. Fuhring, Design into Art, Drawings for Architecture and Ornament, The Lodewijk Houthakker Collection, London, 1989, II, p. 631).
The present work does not relate to any set design, and according to the inscription was playfully drawn by Basoli in front of his friends, on the spot, with the purpose to amuse them, creating this imaginary view of the interior of an Egyptian temple from two accidental ink blots. Two signed drawings by Basoli executed in a similar technique are in the National Gallery of Art, Washington (inv. 1994.9.3, 1994.9.4; ). The main source on the artist remains his autobiography Catalogo delle opere di Antonio Basoli scritto da lui medesimo l’anno 1821, a manuscript preserved at the Accademia Clementina in Bologna (P. Fuhring, Design into Art, Drawings for Architecture and Ornament, The Lodewijk Houthakker Collection, London, 1989, II, p. 631).