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Lot Essay
After the work by Dolci in the Galleria Corsini, Florence. According to the inscription on the reverse of the original, Dolci painted the Poesia between July 1648 and December 1649 for Carlo Buontempi; how the picture found a home with Bartolomeo Corsini (1622-1685) is unknown. Bartolomeo Corsini was elected Cavallerizzo Maggiore by Grand Duke Ferdinando II De' Medici in 1654 and soon after promoted to maestro di camera of the Grand Duchess Vittoria della Rovere. Both profoundly religious, they had a predeliction for pictures by Dolci, a taste that was followed by the members of their court.
The Poesia is perhaps Dolci's most famous work and soon after its creation was lauded in treatises on Florentine art and guidebooks to the city, for example those by Filippo Baldinucci (1681-1728) and Lanzi (1795-1796).
Nineteenth-century guidebooks such Fantozzi's Nuova guida... di Firenze (1842) and Ulderigo Medici's Catalogo della Galleria dei Principi Corsini (1880) contributed to the picture's renown. It is therefore not surprising that numerous copies were produced as souvenirs, of which the present is a fine example.
Three of the landscapes set in the frame are copies after the Seascape with towers, the Port scene with a dockyard, the River landscape by Salvator Rosa, in the Pitti Palace, Florence. The four portraits are copies of Dolci's self portrait, François Xavier Fabre's portrait of Vittorio Alfieri, both in the Uffizi, Florence, and portraits of Dante and Petrarch.
The Poesia is perhaps Dolci's most famous work and soon after its creation was lauded in treatises on Florentine art and guidebooks to the city, for example those by Filippo Baldinucci (1681-1728) and Lanzi (1795-1796).
Nineteenth-century guidebooks such Fantozzi's Nuova guida... di Firenze (1842) and Ulderigo Medici's Catalogo della Galleria dei Principi Corsini (1880) contributed to the picture's renown. It is therefore not surprising that numerous copies were produced as souvenirs, of which the present is a fine example.
Three of the landscapes set in the frame are copies after the Seascape with towers, the Port scene with a dockyard, the River landscape by Salvator Rosa, in the Pitti Palace, Florence. The four portraits are copies of Dolci's self portrait, François Xavier Fabre's portrait of Vittorio Alfieri, both in the Uffizi, Florence, and portraits of Dante and Petrarch.