Viviano Codazzi

This previously unrecorded painting by Codazzi represents a variation of the artist's other capriccio views of the Arch of Titus, such as that recorded in the collection of Charles Verey, Barnsley House, Gloucestershire,¹ or the painting in the Palazzo de Montecitorio, Rome (on loan from the Gallerie degli Uffizi, Florence).² This depiction of the triumphal arch differs somewhat in the inclusion of reliefs and niches between the columns on either side, and the coffering and friezes visible in the interior of the archway. In the right foreground the tall walls of the Farnese garden are visible, and the powder magazine may be seen in the background beyond this – a compositional device employed by Codazzi on a number of occasions.

An old, handwritten label in Spanish on the stretcher reads: 'Viviano Cadagora – nacio 1650 / seque Lanzi El Vitruvio a la Pinctores de Arquitecta'. This refers to Luigi Lanzi's description of Codazzi as the 'Vitruvius of painting' in his History of Painting in Italy, of 1792, reflecting the esteem in which the artist was held for his mastery of perspective and taste for the Antique.

The staffage here is by another, unidentified hand from the circle of Michelangelo Cerquozzi, who collaborated with Codazzi on several works.

We are grateful to Professor David R. Marshall for his help in the cataloguing of this lot, which he dates to the 1650s, and for endorsing the attribution to Codazzi, on the basis of digital images.

¹ D.R. Marshall, Viviano and Niccolò Codazzi and the baroque architectural fantasy

, Rome 1993, pp. 202–3, no. VC 91, reproduced.

² Marshall 1993, p. 203, no. VC 92, reproduced; http://catalogo.fondazionezeri.unibo.it/entry/work/55440/Anonimo%2C%20Arco%20di%20trionfo%20in%20rovina%20con%20figure