Giovanni Costa, “female Portrait", Oil On Canvas

Giovanni Costa, “Female Portrait,” 50x38.5 cm, oil on canvas, signed at upper left “G. Costa 1874.”

The painting offers an elegant portrait of a smiling young woman in a festive moment. The woman's pose is soft and relaxed. Costa's stroke is precise and refined, and the chosen tones give the painting a warm atmosphere.
The painting is embellished with an important coeval gilt wood frame decorated with scrolls at the corners.

BIOGRAPHY:
Giovanni Costa was born in May 1833 in Livorno. He began his studies in his city with Giuseppe Baldini, Fattori's first master, and continued in Pisa, where he copied the frescoes of B. Gozzoli in the Camposanto.
In 1858 he settled in Florence and began attending the Accademia di Belle Arti under the teaching of Enrico Pollastrini.
In his first decade of activity his art focused on religious subjects, for example The Transport of St. Catherine of Alexandria for the Livorno church of S. Maria del Soccorso, or such as Jeremiah on the ruins of Sion, presented at the Promotrice in Florence in 1860. Around the 1970s Costa devoted himself instead to genre scenes, set in the Orient or ancient Rome, or to portraits and landscapes. With his works he also participated in the Vienna and Munich World Expositions, as well as in numerous editions of the Florentine Promotrice.
His works made him a widely appreciated artist: his deft style, which integrated the lesson of the Macchiaioli painters known in Florence, was expressed with a descriptive meticulousness and high-quality technique that earned him considerable success among collectors.
In his last years of activity he concentrated on oriental subjects.
He died in Florence on December 6, 1893.