PISTRUCCI | Iconologia ovvero immagini, 1819

PISTRUCCI, FILIPPO

ICONOLOGIA OVVERO IMMAGINI. MILAN: PAOLO ANTONIO TOSI, 1819

FIRST EDITION, 2 volumes, 4to (314 x 240mm.), half-title, engraved frontispiece, 240 colour plates, nineteenth-century half brown cloth over marbled boards, gilt title to spines, minor spotting to fore-edges, volume 2 joint splitting at head, corners bumped

AN IMPORTANT WORK ON ICONOGRAPHY. Pistrucci (1782-1859) was an artist, writer and Risorgimento patriot who spent part of his career teaching in England. In this publication, he sought to create a more modern reference work for artists and sculptors with the use of colour, which he believed was fundamental component to images' meaning.

The subjects are often portrayed in opposing pairs such as “ambition and humility” and “arrogance and modesty”. The allegory of arrogance is particularly splendid, displayed as an imperious lady with donkey ears and a peacock in her arms. The work influenced the English artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882), who was a friend of Pistrucci.

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