Ligurian School, 18th Century, Madonna With Child And S. Giovannino

Ligurian school, 18th century

Madonna with child and S. Giovannino

Marble, cm alt. 43

Base, cm 16 x 8

The sculpture in question, depicting a Madonna with Child and Saint Giovannino at his feet, is a marble artefact related to the Genoese school of the eighteenth century, developed in the wake of the great Baroque sculptors of the seventeenth century Genoa, such as Pierre Puget (Marseille 1620 -1694) and Filippo Parodi (Genoa, 1630 - Genoa, 22 July 1702). The obvious assimilation of pugetian and parodian models suggests that the work dates back to the very first years of the eighteenth century, when the theme of the sacred, emptied of pathetic accents for a more mild and subdued tone, It acquires a progressive stylization of the distinctive physiognomic forms and traits, such as the cutting of the eyes that becomes sharper.

It is interesting to note how the little Jesus, held in the arms of the Virgin, appears here as an ordinary child, slightly chubby and caught while he seeks the attention of his mother, who instead looks in the distance before him, as if foretelling his dramatic fate. At the foot of the robe, with an equally playful attitude, there is the little saint Giovannino.

It is possible to detect a similar treatment of the theme - here reinterpreted - in the Madonna Carrega by Pierre Puget now kept in the Museum of Sant'Agostino di Genova and in the two-faced statue with Madonna and Child and Saint Anthony and child by unknown Genoese sculptor of the second half of the seventeenth century preserved in the same museum. A further reference is to be traced in the production of Filippo Parodi: the treatment of the child and the pose of his Madonna del Carmine of the Church of Santi Vittore and Carlo in Genoa can only have been spat for the present plasticizer.