(Tocco da Casauria 1851 - Francavilla al Mare 1929)
DRAFT OF A LETTER WITH SEVERAL SKETCHES, mid-1870s
Pen and black ink on wove paper. Irregular dimensions, 203 x 268 mm.
Here a list of the sketches.
Recto:
a) study of a male head in pen and black ink, touched in brown wash (possibly a portrait of the sculptor Costantino Barbella)
b) a small sketch in pencil of a standing female figure
c) standing female figure in pen and black ink, touched in brown wash
d) a small sketch in pencil of a lying female figure
e) half-length portrait of a young peasant woman in pen and black ink, touched in brown wash (the study is comparable to many figures of peasant girls that appear in Michetti's works around the mid-1870s)
Verso:
f) three studies of eyes in pen and black ink
g) sketch of an architectural detail in pen and black ink
PROVENANCE: Bernasconi, Marià Elvira Celia Méndez de (L.5374)
Probably the addressee of the letter is Domenico Morelli.
In all likelihood the sketches can be dated within the 1870s.
RESERVED
Francesco Paolo Michetti was taught at the Accademia in Naples by Morelli, but he also attended the life drawing classes of Filippo Palizzi, who exercised the greatest influence on his development. In 1871 Michetti made his first trip to Paris. There he came in contact with Fortuny, De Nittis and the dealer Goupil and exhibited at the Salons of 1872 and 1875. In 1883 Michetti purchased a convent in his homeland, Abruzzo, as his home and studio. For the next twenty years, the convent was a meeting place for artists and exponents of culture. Abruzzo was Michetti's emotional and aesthetic inspiration: he combined studies from life and extensive photographic documentation, capturing its people, animals, and local events in emotionally charged paintings with luminous colors and vibrant light.
