PIOLA PELLEGRO (1617-1640) Lot n° 180

PIOLA PELLEGRO (1617-1640) Madonna and Child (The Immaculate Virgin with the Salvator Mundi) Oil on canvas, cm 160x120 A statuesque Madonna is monumental for the way she stands to the relative, with a slightly upward vision. Yet she smiles, and so does the little Jesus, softening the image that thus takes on a more colloquial tone, in spite of the first impact of great austerity in the composition, so essential and rigorous in the choice of a neutral background so that the two silhouettes stand out decisively. The Madonna sits on a stool that seems simple, as in any humble house. But that seat is placed on a pedestal, on a sort of balustrade that marks the lower limit of the scenic space. And between the Virgin's feet creeps the snake that alludes to evil defeated, trampled. As if to remind us that she who is in front of us is not just any mother, but the Immaculate, to whom the Child hands a rose. Not only because it is the most beautiful flower, but because it is an attribute of Mary, the "mystical rose", according to what the Litanies say. As for Jesus, caught as if by surprise by the rapacious gaze of the painter, he turns to us, and in offering the rose to his Mother, he receives a small globe with a cross, his attribute of sovereignty as Salvator Mundi. This amazing mix of theatricality and naturalness, of classicism and realism comes from the mind and the brush of a painter who died at the age of 24 , but was much praised by his contemporaries: Pellegro Piola, Domenico's elder brother, of whom he is certainly less known and much rarer. Raffaele Soprani remembers 'his virtuous talent', and in his 'life' published in 1674 he writes: 'he had the sudioso giovane habilità non ordinaria'. Moreover, he provides us with a detailed description of some of his works exhibited to the public, which can still be traced and therefore certain references for the reconstruction of others that can be attributed to him. Among these, the unpublished work presented here is a quality find and very consistent with the stylistic peculiarities of this painter. It is enough to compare it with the so-called Madonna degli Orefici, formerly in the street of the same name and now at the Accademia Ligustica, quoted by Soprani (fig. 1), or with the Sacra Famiglia con San Giovannino in the Galleria Nazionale di Palazzo Spinola, added more recently by contemporary critics to Pellegro (fig. 2). Finally, we would like to point out the existence of an autograph version almost identical to the present one also in format (fig. 3), already recognized by the writer to the painter. Anna Orlando 2015