Portrait Of The Marquis Raffaele Guarnieri, Signed Felix Maria Diogg, Dated 1799, Oil On Panel

Portrait of Raffaele Guarnieri, Marquis of Mallare, husband of Angela Del Caretto di Balestrino, father of Aurelia Guarnieri who married Ippolito Spinola, son of Giuseppe Tomaso and Antonio Frajon de Villeneuve. Oil on wood panel from the end of the 18th century, signed "Diogg" on the back lower left and dated 1799. Good condition, dimensions without frame H16.6 cm x W12.4 cm, dimensions with frame as is H24.5 cm x W20.5 cm (arrowed frame). Shipping costs, please contact us. Felix Maria Diogg was born in early July 1762 in Andermatt, son of Johann Columban and Katharina Deflorin, von Tavetsch. His father worked as a farmer, carpenter, painter and gilder. After the great fire in the village (1766), the family was forced to move to Tschamut. It was there that the Prince Abbot of Disentis, Columban Sozzi, recognized the young shepherd's talent. He allowed him to study under the painter Johann Melchior Wyrsch, who ran an art academy in Besançon, in 1780. In 1782, the death of his father called him back to Andermatt. His previous training already allowed him to work as a portrait painter. Between 1785 and 1788, Diogg completed his training in Florence, Rome, and Naples, where he studied, among others, Raphael Domenichino and Carricci. Health reasons forced him to return, and from 1789 onward, he was more or less on the move. From 1790, Diogg was in Rapperswil. 1792 Marriage to Lisette Curti, daughter of Karl Ludwig, guild master. Diogg received numerous portrait commissions from the upper middle class. In 1794, influenced by the ideas of the French Revolution, he published an open letter denouncing the hypocrisy of the small-town aristocracy. Diogg became the most important neoclassical portrait painter in Switzerland. In 1797, he met Goethe in Stäfa. A politically active man, Diogg was often on the move. He painted in Appenzell, St. Gallen, and Herisau, from 1799 to 1809 in Bern and western Switzerland, and later in Alsace and Karlsruhe, where he depicted the Russian Tsarina Elizabeth Alexeievna in 1814. Zurich remained the center of his sphere of influence. Diogg died in Rapperswil in 1834.