Felice Giani
Italian, 1758 - 1823
Italian painter and draughtsman. He was a prolific painter who, with a team of artists and craftsmen, decorated palaces and public buildings in Rome, Venice, many cities in Emilia Romagna (especially Faenza), and in France. He worked in a distinctive Neo-classical style, creating sumptuous, richly coloured rooms, the paintings on walls and ceilings being surrounded with a wealth of antique ornament. Despite the turbulent era of revolution and war (1789–1815) he never lacked commissions, for which he chose subjects from the literature and history of Greece and Rome that were symbolic both for him and for his patrons. He was a prodigiously talented draughtsman, who drew constantly, both out of doors and in the studio.
1. Painting.
(i) Before 1798.
He first studied in Pavia with Carlo Antonio Bianchi and Antonio Galli-Bibiena. In 1778–9 he attended the Accademia Clementina, Bologna, where he won a prize, and from 1780 to 1783 continued his studies in Rome at the Accademia di S Luca. In an autograph note (New York, Cooper-Hewitt Mus.) he referred to Pompeo Batoni, Cristofero Unterberger and the architect Giovanni Antonio Antolini as his teachers; he also associated with Giuseppe Cades. In 1785–7 he shared rooms with Francesco Caucig (1762–1828) and the two artists drew together in Rome and in the surrounding countryside. Giani sketched many Roman views (e.g. Tomb of the Horatii and Curiatii; Rome, Bib. Ist. N. Archeol. & Stor. A.), and drew vivid sketches of the life of artists in Rome (e.g. Osteria miserabilissima; Rome, Bib. Hertz.).
Giani’s knowledge of Roman remains, which helped to forge his Neo-classical style, is evident from his earliest commissioned works. These came from Faenza in 1786 and 1787: in 1786–7 he decorated the Galleria dei Cento Pacifici with the Triumph of Titus (now damaged); in 1787 two rooms in the Palazzo Conti Sinibaldi with scenes from early Roman history and various gods and mythological figures (all in situ). Both decorations show the voluminously draped classical figures in antique-inspired surroundings that are characteristic of Giani’s art. Having created his personal Neo-classical mode, he never changed it, and thus there is no evident development in his art.
Between 1787 and 1793 Giani worked in the richly decorated apartments created in the Palazzo Altieri, Rome, under the direction of the architect Giuseppe Barberi (1746–1809). Barberi’s Noble Cabinet is one of the finest of Neo-classical rooms, uniting classical architecture, marble friezes, furniture, painted decorations, framed paintings and stuccowork. Here Giani played a minor role, contributing figures to landscape paintings and perhaps designing the frieze of putti executed by Vincenzo Pacetti. In the Winter Bedroom the major decorations (in situ) are entirely his. In the curve of the vault he painted long narrow panels showing a series of triumphs; of Venus, of Prosperity, of Eros and of the Arts. The colours are beautifully limpid and light, the draperies billowing, the figures animated. The inspiration is from Raphael, the immediate model being the latter’s decoration in the Vatican Loggie. The ceiling is of light-coloured, elegant stuccos, with painted putti in the vault compartments. In the Oval Boudoir all the decoration (in situ) is attributable to Giani, including three paintings: Atalanta and Hippomenes, Diana and Actaeon and the Judgement of Paris. Again, the whole effect is of richness, elegance and lightness. In the Summer Bedroom he painted the centre roundel of Paris and Helen on the ceiling; in the Pompeiian Room, the putti on Pompeiian red walls (all in situ). There is a letter of 1792 in which Giani mentions that he has recently visited Naples, and a sketchbook (Rome, Bib. Ist. N. Archeol. & Stor. A.) contains many copies of Pompeiian wall paintings. In Rome Giani also led the liberal academy, the Accademia dei Pensieri, which was active from c. 1790 to c. 1796 and included such members as Anne-Louis Girodet and François-Xavier Fabre.
Further work in Faenza followed, for which Giani organized a team of artists, usually four: himself, Gaetano Bertolani (1758/9–1856), a decorative painter, Antonio Trentanove (c. 1745–1812), a sculptor in stucco, and one other. Giani’s team was responsible for the entire ensemble in a room or suite of rooms, including the furniture, but usually not the architecture. Once a commission was finished, the entire team moved on together to the next project. Between 1794 and 1796 his team decorated the Palazzo Laderchi, where Giani’s paintings of the Story of Psyche are framed by elegant stuccos and set off by panels painted with grotesques (all in situ). The artists stayed in a house in Brisighella, near Faenza, which still exists, and an album of drawings, Da Faenza a Marradi (1794; Forlì, Bib. Com. Saffi), contains views of the house, of Brisighella and of the artists enjoying country relaxations. Some of these, such as Giani and his Friends at the Casa Brisighella, reveal Giani’s informal and Bohemian character.
(ii) From 1798.
Giani was involved with revolutionary and pro-French causes, as is evidenced by two paintings, the Triumphal Arch and the Altar of the Fatherland (both Rome, Pal. Braschi), which record the Festa della Federazione in Rome on 20 March 1798; and two drawings, Monument with Standing Figure and Equestrian Monument (both c. 1801; New York, Cooper-Hewitt Mus.), which are connected with Antolini’s unrealized project for a Foro Bonaparte in Milan. His politics furthered his artistic career, since many of his patrons were of his persuasion and played a powerful role in the links between Italy and France.
From 1800 Giani and his team were occupied with commissions in Rome and Venice, and in the Veneto and Emilia Romagna. Perhaps their finest work was the decorative ensemble created (1804–5; in situ) in four rooms on the piano nobile of the Palazzo Milzetti, Faenza, which is a tribute to the classical learning of the patron, Conte Francesco Milzetti. In the octagonal anteroom Giani’s central ceiling painting, Apollo in his Chariot, forms the splendid climax to a rich array of stucco reliefs, painted simulated reliefs and painted lunettes in grisaille showing winged putti bearing the symbols of the four seasons and of the zodiac. The Galleria d’Achille, the principal room for entertainments, displays Giani’s austerely Neo-classical paintings in the flattened lunettes over the end walls and on the vaulted ceiling. Grisaille paintings and stuccos enrich the walls and frame the five richly coloured ceiling paintings illustrating the Homeric story of Achilles in the Trojan War. In the smaller Sala di Numa, Giani painted 18 scenes from the life of Numa Pompilius, the second king of ancient Rome, and in the Sala d’Ulisse the story of Ulysses’ return to Ithaca, framed by borders of grotesque decoration.
In 1805 Giani was part of a team that decorated a triumphal arch celebrating the Emperor Napoleon’s entry into Bologna (eight drawings; New York, Cooper-Hewitt Mus.) and in 1807 he decorated rooms in the Ala Napoleonica, Venice. Antonio Aldini (1755–1826), one of the Bolognese delegation that greeted Napoleon, commissioned Giani (1805) to decorate the Palazzo Aldini in Bologna with scenes from Roman history (in situ); in 1810 Giani also decorated Aldini’s celebrated Neo-classical villa (now Villa Aldini) overlooking Bologna (decorations untraced).
Giani’s outstanding decoration in Bologna was that of the Palazzo Marescalchi, commissioned by Ferdinando Marescalchi (1754–1816), who, like Aldini, was pro-French and represented the Kingdom of Italy at the court of Napoleon in Paris. The oval dining-room (1810) is the finest part of this work, and, since no architect is mentioned in the documents, Giani may himself have designed the oval space with its loggia-like corners formed of eight pairs of free-standing Corinthian columns and eight Corinthian pilasters, fitted into the rectangular room. The paintings (in situ) show scenes from the early part of Virgil’s Aeneid, with an oval Banquet of Aeneas and Dido, apposite for a dining-room, in the centre of the panelled ceiling. Around it are four oval paintings and two octagons. The painted grotesque decorations, in the style of Raphael, are by Bertolani, and the exquisite stuccos, for which Giani made the drawings, are by Marc’Antonio Trefogli (1782–1854), who had replaced Trentanove.
In 1811 Giani was elected to the Accademia di S Luca, Rome. In 1812 he decorated rooms in the Palazzo Quirinale, Rome, for a projected visit of Napoleon. Among these are ceiling pictures, the Triumph of War and the Triumph of Peace (in situ). In 1812–13 he was in France, where he decorated the villa at Montmorency belonging to Aldini, then Secretary of State for the Kingdom of Italy, and carried out decorations at the Tuileries palace and at Malmaison (all destr.). Many drawings of the park at Montmorency survive from this visit (Bologna, Pin. N.). There followed further commissions in the cities of Emilia Romagna, among them the decoration of the Palazzo Sampieri (1815) and the Casa Martinetti (1820) in Bologna, and of the Palazzi Cavina (1816) and Pasolini dall’Onda (1817–18) at Faenza. He was honoured in his own time and in 1819 was made a member of the Accademia dei Virtuosi del Pantheon. The decoration (1821; destr.) of the ceiling of the Teatro Valle in Rome was one of his last works. Giuseppe Valadier, the architect for the project, included a large engraving and a description of it in his book on his own works, Opere di architettura e di ornamento ideate ed eseguite da Giuseppe Valadier (1833). In 1822 Giani was working in Faenza, but a fall and an injured finger caused him to return to his house in Rome, where he died the following year.
Although Giani occasionally painted in gouache, in oil on canvas and in encaustic, his preferred medium was tempera on plaster. There is a great effect of richness and colour in his paintings, though the palette in general tends towards lighter colours than those of oil painting. Rosy and pale flesh tones contrast with rather acid greens and blues, and with warm yellows, oranges and reds in the flowing draperies. The paintings appear to be drawings in colour, with the point of the brush used in various colours to draw contours and shading lines. Few easel paintings by Giani are now known.
2. Drawing.
Giani made very accomplished drawings in black chalk (e.g. Venetian Architectural Capriccio, ?1807–14; New York, Cooper-Hewitt Mus.), but his most extensively used medium was pen and brown ink and wash, often over very sketchy drawing in black chalk. A few drawings have watercolour, and a splendid oversized drawing (1821; New York, Cooper-Hewitt Mus.) for the ceiling of the Teatro Valle shows a central figure of Victory and some of the surrounding Muses in delicate watercolour. In general, however, colour harmonies for paintings do not seem to have been studied thoroughly in the drawings. Certain very large drawings with brown wash may have been intended as virtuoso pieces in themselves, such as Alexander and Diogenes (New York, Cooper-Hewitt Mus.) and The Greeks in the Cave of Polyphemus (New York, Cooper-Hewitt Mus.). In this connection may be mentioned Giani’s participation in 1803 in the Accademia della Pace in Bologna, where artists gathered weekly to make drawings on a designated subject and submitted these works to their fellow artists for criticism.
Many of Giani’s drawings are of figure subjects he was to paint as part of decorative schemes. Some show these compositions in the context of a compartmented ceiling; others indicated work to be executed by fellow artists of the scheme. The Cooper-Hewitt Museum, New York, has 32 bozzetti for the decorations (1804–5) in the Palazzo Milzetti, Faenza. Many of these free and spontaneous drawings are squared off and many, such as the drawing for Apollo in his Chariot (New York, Cooper-Hewitt Mus.), are strikingly close to the finished paintings. A drawing for the ceiling of the Sala d’Ulisse shows all nine scenes on one sheet, accompanied by captions.
There are also numerous sketchbook pages, large and small, after works by other artists, or of architecture and decorative schemes, often bearing detailed inscriptions of colours and materials. Examples in the Cooper-Hewitt Museum include a sketchbook page, inscribed 1818, with sketches of architecture and sculpture, and other pages with copies of pictures by Correggio. Giani seems to have continued this practice throughout his career.
Phyllis Dearborn Massar. "Giani, Felice." In Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online, http://www.oxfordartonline.com.proxy.lib.fsu.edu/subscriber/article/grove/art/T032078 (accessed April 10, 2012).
Person TypeIndividual
Italian, 1606 - 1680