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Marco Ricci (Belluno 1676-Venice 1730)

Maria Giustina Turcotti c. 1720-30

Pen and brown ink | 18.7 x 10.7 cm (sheet of paper) | RCIN 907357

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  • Recto: a pen and ink drawing of a female singer represented as a martyr: standing in profile to the left with a halo over her head and a palm held resting on her shoulder; wearing a headdress with a long veil and a dress with a hooped skirt.This is a caricature of Maria Giustina Turcotti probably represented in one of three operas staged at the Teatro San Angelo between October 1721, and February 1722: as Leonora in Cimene, as Armida in Gli eccessi della Gelosia, or as Gildippe in L'innocenza difesa. Edward Croft-Murray proposes that her portrayal as a martyr is more probably a personal allusion to her, rather than a representation of her in a particular role. Verso: the head of a young woman facing front, smiling. This performer is also the subject of RCIN 907375.

    This drawing belongs to an album of operatic caricatures mainly by Marco Ricci and Anton Maria Zanetti the Elder, an intact album from the library of Joseph Smith. Zanetti and another Venetian collector, Francesco Algarotti, owned similar albums, with many of the caricatures copied or traced, with identifying inscriptions. Zanetti's album is now in the Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, and Algarotti's belongs to Albert Gellman and is in the Israel Museum, Jerusalem. A related drawing of Turcotti is Zanetti's album of caricatures in the Fondazione Cini: inv. 36509. She is also represented in RCIN 907358, and RCIN 907415.

    Opera was an important part of Venetian society and culture, and such caricatures were circulated among friends and collectors for light-hearted amusement. Joseph Smith was a keen opera lover who was married to the English opera singer Catherine Tofts and kept a box at the Teatro San Grisostomo in Venice. He collected operatic caricatures of the singers and performers of the day as well as artists and other well-known characters by Marco Ricci and others, and had them bound into this album. The drawings were shared and circulated among the three collectors and their circle as light-hearted amusement, but the artistic caricature was also a long established practice in Italian art.

    Provenance

    From the collection of Consul Joseph Smith; acquired by George III in 1762

  • Medium and techniques

    Pen and brown ink

    Measurements

    18.7 x 10.7 cm (sheet of paper)

  • Other number(s)

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