Allegory Of Vigilance And The Oblivion Of Love – Pietro Liberi (1614 – 1687)

Oil on canvas. Venitian School middle of the 17th century, attributed to Pietro Liberi.
In the warmth of an azure summer night, like a goddess, a nude female figure, surrounded by billowing sheets, watches over a sleeping child. At first glance, the viewer is struck by the beauty of this composition's pictorial writing, but soon mystery surrounds its enigmatic iconography. It's by reading the lines of Cesare Ripa's precious treatise “Iconologia” - published in 1593 and intended to “serve poets, painters and sculptors in representing human virtues, vices, sentiments and passions” - that the veil is lifted on the scholarly meaning of our painting. This woman, holding an oil lamp in one hand to light the night and a bell in the other to warn of danger, is the embodiment of Vigilance. The rooster over her shoulder, symbolizing Vigilance, scans the horizon to warn of perils. Usually, this allegorical representation stands on its own, so how do we explain the presence of this delightful sleeping child wearing a crown of flowers? Our knowledge of botany has given us the beginnings of an answer: these are not ordinary flowers, but poppies characterized by butterfly-shaped buds. And it's in Cesare Ripa's treatise that we find the interpretation of this other allegory: this child crowned with poppy flowers embodies the forgetfulness of love. Sleeping Love illustrates the idea that Lovers quickly forget their beloved subject, the ardor they show during the conquest of love waning once the other has been tamed. The poppy symbolizes sleep and oblivion, the two effects of the flower on those who use it, the two ideas coming together in the general idea of oblivion. This carnal masterpiece leads us irrevocably to the man who dominated Venetian painting in the mid-17th century: Pietro Liberi. A fertile artist with an inexhaustible imagination, the man nicknamed “Il Libertino” (the libertine) because of his licentious compositions, is the undisputed master of allegory and so-called “scholarly” painting. Historians explain this by Liberi's probable Rosicrucian knowledge, as well as his study of the cabala and alchemy.

The work is set in a spectacular “Sansovino” frame in carved, gilded and brown rechampi wood, custom-made by one of Italy's finest craftsmen.
Dimensions: 96,5 x 128 cm – 123,5 x 155,5 cm avec le cadre

Biography : Pietro Liberi (Padua 1614 - Venice 1687) was a central figure in the Baroque evolution of Venetian painting in the second half of the 17th century. Liberi's life is well documented thanks to Count Galeazzo Gualdo Priorato, who published his biography in 1664. After spending an adventurous youth fighting the Turks and traveling throughout Europe, his artistic vocation was consolidated in Rome, where he probably frequented the studio of Pierre de Cortone. A stay in Tuscany followed, where he experimented with everything from Cesare Dandini's vouettism to Guido Reni's classicism. But it was not until his definitive return to Venice that Liberi became aware of his own stylistic mannerisms, returning him to a very carnal evocation of Veronese's pictorial universe. A prolific artist of great artistic flair, protected in Vienna by Archduke Leopold Wilhelm and Emperor Leopold I, he was the official painter of the Republic of Venice. Pietro Liberi decorated churches, palaces and villas, and his most prestigious commissions include: Among his most prestigious commissions were The Battle of the Dardanelles (Palazzo Ducale, Venice), The Bronze Serpent (Cathedral of San Pietro in Castello), The Flood (Church of S. Maria Maggiore, Bergamo), The Annunciation (Church of the Salute, Venice) and The Mystical Marriage of Saint Catherine (Church of S. Caterina, Vicenza). His son Marco (c. 1644 - c. 1691), also a painter, was one of his imitators.

Bibliography:
- RUGGERI, Ugo, Pietro e Marco Liberi, pittori nella Venezia del seicento, Stefano Patacconi Editore, 1996.
- LUCCO, Marco, La pittura nel Veneto, Il Seicento, Electa, 2000.
- MARTINI, Egidio, Pittura Veneta e altra Italiana dal XV al XIX secolo, Stefano Patacconi Editore,
- SAFARIK, Eduard Alexandr, MILANTONI, Gabriello, La pittura del Seicento a Venezia, dans le catalogue collectif La Pittura in Italia. Il Seicento, Tome I, Banca Nazionale dell’Agricoltura, 1988
- LOIRE, Stéphane, Peintures italiennes du XVIIe siècle du musée du louvre, Gallimard/Musée du Louvre Editions, 2006.
- PRIORATO, Galeazzo Gualdo, Vita del cavaliere Pietro Liberi, pittore padovano, Edition tardive Tipogragia Paroni, 1664/1818.
- RIPA Cesare, traduit par BAUDOIN Jean, Iconologie ou les principales choses qui peuvent tomber dans la pensée touchant les vices et les vertus sont représentées sous diverses figures, Paris, 1643.
- BAR Virginie, BREME Dominique, Dictionnaire Iconologique, les allégories et les symboles de Cesare Ripa et Jean Baudoin, Editions Faton, 1999.