Francesco Lavagna (naples 1684-1724), still Life With Flowers And Watermelon

Francesco Lavagna (Naples 1684-1724), Still life with flowers and watermelon andhermas with garden in the background 
Measures: cm H 48 x W 65, frame H 66x W 65 x P 6 

The painting, beautifully made and in good condition, depicts asumptuous composition of flowers and fruits in an elegant garden. Attributableto the Neapolitan painter Francesco Lavagna, it presents compositional andstylistic analogies with certain and signed works of the painter. In our collection we also propose a couple ofpaintings attributed to the Blackboard and of the same size. In the painting proposed here we see compositionsof flowers lying on the ground before a wicker basket resting on a watermelon.On the right a watermelon split in half and some figs chromatically balance thecomposition. In the background we see a triumph of flowers inside a large vasedecorated with anthropomorphic heads and a herma, also decorated with flowers.On the right architectural elements and a column draw a fifth to the scene. Thecomposition leaves ample space to the description of the surroundingenvironment: it is a formal garden, or Italian, characterized by a geometricsubdivision of the spaces obtained with the use of hedges and plant sculpturesobtained by pruning evergreen bushes. You can see a topiary in boxwood, arched,while a fifth of trees stands out on a blue sky, in which there are some softclouds.Clearly belonging to the Neapolitan school, thecanvas shows undisputed analogies with the style of the painter FrancescoLavagna (1684-1724). It is one of the protagonists of Neapolitan naturamortismof the early eighteenth century. The eighteenth-century Neapolitan, in thefield of still life, is much appreciated and sought after today by both theantique market and critics. It was appreciated and much requested in the pastby the great collectors and patrons, rich lords owners of the most beautiful buildingsof Naples and surroundings. Today it is still under study, and FrancescoLavagna himself has very little information. Many artists have ventured intonaturamortism and their figures are slowly emerging from oblivion, allowingcritics to outline their stylistic characteristics, grouping corpus of worksunder some names mainly thanks to the discovery of signed works. It is still very difficult to distinguish thehand of some painters such as Giuseppe and Francesco Lavagna and Gaspare Lopez.The same works appear in catalogues and in the antique market sometimesattributed to one, sometimes to the other artist. Francesco Lavagna, as mentioned, is active inNaples in the first half of the 18th century. He is often confused with GaspareLopez and Giuseppe Lavagna, probably linked to him by a bond of kinship, andalso an interpreter of the same pictorial genre. The canvas documents very well the expressivequalities of Francesco Lavagna, able to create works never banal and full of adescriptive ability, of remarkable visual impact, in the rendering of theeffects of light, color and matter, characterized by a fine and meticulousbrushstroke. 
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