Giovanni Maria Delle Piane Called The Mulinaretto, Attr.(1660 -1745), Portraits Of Nobildonne

Giovanni Maria delle Piane called the Mulinaretto, attr.

(Genoa, 1660 - Monticelli d'Ongina, 28 June 1745)

Couple of portraits of Nobildonne

Oil on oval canvas, cm 73 x 98

The beautiful pair of portraits proposed, depicting two noble Genoese gentlemen, dressed sumptuously and elegantly, illustrates the stylistic canons typical of the painting of Giovanni Maria Delle Piane known as the Mulinaretto, successful author of Genoese portraiture of French imprint. 

Giovanni Maria Delle Piane, known as the Mulinaretto by the nickname of his grandfather who was a miller, was born in Genoa in 1660.

Already at a very young age he began to attend the workshop of Giovanni Battista Merano, here he learned the basics of painting until, in 1676, he undertook an important trip to Rome to study under the teachings of Giovanni Battista Gaulli (Genoa, 8 May 1639 - Rome, 2 April 1709)

Here he remained until 1684, when he returned to Genoa, a year after the death of Giovanni Battista Carbone, the greatest Genoese portrait painter of the time. He was immediately recognized by the local aristocracy as the substitute of the master, the only one able to adapt to the new fashions and needs of the time. 

During this Genoese period Mulinaretto painted many portraits, some of which are still identifiable, such as portraits for Gian Battista Cattaneo, for Doge Pietro Durazzo, or for the Doria family in which lavish clothes and witty movements are references to Rigaud and Largillière, whose French fashion had now arrived in Genoa.

In 1695 he was invited by Count Morando to Parma, where he met the Farnese family, for whom he made some portraits. He also had other commissions, between Emilia and Liguria, and performed several sacred works. His latest production, however, constitutes a separate chapter, and shows his fidelity to the Roman formation (Custodian Angel; Virgin with Child).
In 1705 he painted the portrait of the Duke of Vendome commander of the Franco-Spanish troops and in the same year a few months later he moved to Piacenza.

He returned for a short stay in Genoa, leaving in 1706 for Parma and then Milan. In 1709, again in Parma, he painted the «portrait of Prince Antonio Farnese on horseback» (there is an equestrian portrait of the mill at the Galleria Nazionale di Parma).

In 1714 he executed one of the portraits of Elisabetta Farnese, signed and dated, kept in Piacenza, at the Alberoni Gallery: probably at the same time the Portrait of Filippo V, Naples, Museo di San Martino, the husband of that one. Later should be the Portrait of Elizabeth Farnese Queen (Caserta, Royal Palace). 

Thanks to his skills he was invited, in 1719, to go to Spain as a portrait painter of confidence of Queen Elizabeth; the painter refused apparently because of his age. He stayed for a time at the court of King Charles of Bourbon, who appointed him a chamber painter and commissioned the paintings for him and his wife Maria Amalia of Saxony.

Returning to Genoa in 1741, he soon moved to Monticelli d'Ongina in Piacenza where his son lived: here he spent the last years of his almost blind life and died in 1745.

In the present couple are clear references to the portrait style of Mulinaretto. Our eyes can only dwell on the technical skill with which the precious fabrics are made: from the finely decorated corset of the lady in pink to the thin and elaborate lace and the elaborate gold and blue brocade of the lady in red. But not only that, even the lucid and amused flicker of their expressions recalls some of the most important portraits of the Ligurian master. 

As proof of his authorship we can see paintings such as the Portrait of a Lady with a Servant and the Portrait of a Lady with Dogs as well as the Portrait of Elisabetta Farnese kept at the Royal Palace of Caserta.

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