La rete d'amor

Raimondo Pereda was born in Lugano, studied at the Accademia de Brera in Milan and exhibited in Munich from 1870-84 and at the Paris Salon from 1879-80. However it was his submission of works to the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition in 1876 for which the artist was especially lauded. Pereda exhibited a variant of this playful work among the 'specimens of that flexible, winning, seductive treatment of marble which made the Italian sculpture at the Centennial a revelation' (Watson, The Masterpieces of the International Exhibition, Philadelphia, 1876, pp. 114-5). His works, dispersed through six large galleries of paintings and sculpture by masters such as Barzaghi, Zocchi and Pagani, were critically acclaim for their exceptional execution and gracefulness. The present composition, known as Love's Net, garnered specific mention: 'In the ‘Rete d’Amore’ the girl willingly allows herself to be entangled in the network of Love, and draws the net around her heart' (J. McCabe, The Illustrated History of the Centennial Exhibition, held in commemoration of the one hundredth anniversary of American Independence, Philadelphia, 1876, p. 536).