Skip to main content
Want more images or videos?
Request additional images or videos from the seller
1 of 12

Modesto Faustini
"Portrait of Elegant" Oil on Canvas Figurative Painting of the Nineteenth Century Italian

circa 1870

$21,350.08
£15,917.44
€18,000
CA$29,321.13
A$32,816.14
CHF 17,135.15
MX$400,358.81
NOK 217,508.19
SEK 206,401.88
DKK 137,103.80
Shipping
Retrieving quote...
The 1stDibs Promise:
Authenticity Guarantee,
Money-Back Guarantee,
24-Hour Cancellation

About the Item

Modesto Faustini (1839-1891), "Portrait of elegant," oil on canvas in gilt frame signed lower right "M. Faustini - Rome." This splendid portrait belongs to one of the most flourishing periods of nineteenth-century Italy, in a Rome invaded by young painters from all over Europe in search of new inspiration and artistic models. Faustini excelled in female portraiture, preceding and inspiring painters of the caliber of Boldini. The young woman depicted is one of his favorite models, who also appears in "Pompeian Idyll" of 1864; she may be Niny Manziana, model and muse for numerous painters. A woman of great intellectual vivacity as well as great beauty, an exhibition was dedicated to her in 2021 for her contribution to Brescian art between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Modesto Faustini was born in Brescia on May 27, 1839. Orphaned at the age of six, he was taken in at the Pio Luogo Orfani in Brescia, where in 1855 Don Eugenio Dallola was appointed director, who immediately noticed the boy's artistic talents; he decided to take care of his schooling and had him admitted to the School of Drawing in Brescia. Here his skills earned him numerous medals to the point that in 1861 he was able to enter the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Milan. Here, too, the successes are numerous, and it is to this period that his first known paintings date. In 1869, thanks to a competition announced by the City of Brescia, he was awarded a two-year advanced training pension in Rome. Modesto arrived there in 1869; he was already in his thirties and his artistic career was not without satisfaction. Rome is still part of the small papal state, the Roman artistic milieu is decidedly conservative and lagging behind the innovative instances arising in other Italian cities (the Tuscany of the Macchiaioli, the Naples of Resina and Palizzi, the "scapigliata" Milan) but still continues to be in the imagination of many young people a destination inescapable and the meeting point for European artists. Faustini lived through a delicate historical moment and the transition from the older generation of Romanticism to the young Scapigliati, who later in the century would break away completely from academicism to follow the creed of free painting. In Rome he began to engage with artists from all over Italy and European countries, in an environment rich in artistic and intellectual stimulation. His era immediately linked him to the current of historicism, an example for all "The Arrest of Luisa Sanfelice," which, presented at the Turin Exposition, was purchased by the royal house. But there is no shortage of traditional Roman subjects, a long series of ciociare, ciociarelli and cardinals who had fascinated him. His ambitions and a higher idea of painting brought him closer to the fledgling Pre-Raphaelite movement. Thus began the important commissions of sacred painting, imbued with a fifteenth-century purity as much in color as in design and concept, so much so that to him more than to others can be traced true Pre-Raphaelism modern. He died prematurely in 1891, failing to reach the 20th century that would be the springboard for many Italian artists, Boldini foremost among them. Numerous museums and public and private collections host Faustini's paintings, first and foremost the Civic Museums of Brescia, which in 2003 hosted a monographic exhibition dedicated to the painter.
  • Creator:
    Modesto Faustini (1839 - 1891, Italian)
  • Creation Year:
    circa 1870
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 34.65 in (88 cm)Width: 28.75 in (73 cm)
  • More Editions & Sizes:
    tela cm 62 x 46Price: $21,350
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
    The painting is on second canvas. It was restored in Milan at the Plazzoli studio. It has a beautiful coeval gilt wood frame.
  • Gallery Location:
    Pistoia, IT
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU2746215373952

More From This Seller

View All
"Portrait of Elegant" Signed and dated 1895 Oil on Canvas in Frame
Located in Pistoia, IT
Octave GALLIAN (1855-1918) "Portrait of Elegant" , oil painting on canvas signed and dated 1895 lower right. Magnificent portrait depicting a young woman with deep dark eyes and rave...
Category

Late 19th Century French School Portrait Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Portrait of Madame Vayou French Art Nouveau Painting in Gilded Frame
Located in Pistoia, IT
Antoine-Auguste Thivet (1856-1927) Portrait of Madame Vayou, oil on cardboard signed, dated 1893 and dedicated. In its original white lacquered and gilded wooden frame. Origin: hered...
Category

Late 19th Century Art Nouveau Portrait Paintings

Materials

Oil, Cardboard

Portrait of a Girl Oil on Canvas in Frame French School Signed
Located in Pistoia, IT
Portrait of a girl in Art Deco style, French School around 1920, signed by painter Hélène Le Roy d'Etiolles. Oil on canvas in gilt frame. This splendid portrait comes to us from the ...
Category

1920s Art Deco Portrait Paintings

Materials

Oil

"Portrait of Elegant" Oil on wood Expressionist Hague School Signed
Located in Pistoia, IT
Martin Borgord (1869-1935) Active in California, New York, Paris, Holland "Portrait of an Elegant Woman," oil painting on wood signed lower right and dedicated to Madame Merlet. Attended: San Francisco Art Association School of Design, Académie des Beaux-Arts de Paris, Académie Julian de Paris, New York School of Art "In the past I worked on light and shadow effects. Now I paint exclusively for unusual effects and color harmonies." It is with these words that Martin Borgord, a Norwegian-born but naturalized American painter, interviewed by a journalist from the Hartford Courant, explains our painting.Straddling the line between Impressionism and Expressionism, the elegant lady loses the sharpness of detail, blending with light and color in quick, dense brushstrokes. Excellent state of preservation.Presented in antique carved and silvered wooden frame. It has a regular Fine Arts export certificate. Measurements Panel 41 x 33 cm Frame 51x43 cm BIOGRAPHY Martin Borgord was born February 8, 1869, in Guasdal, Norway, and died March 25, 1935, in Riverside, California. At the age of 16, Borgord resided in San Francisco and enrolled to study with Virgil Macey Williams (1830-1886) at the San Francisco Art Association School of Design. Interested in both painting and sculpture, Borgord will go to Paris. He was accepted to study at the Académie Julian with Jean-Paul Laurens and at the Académie des Beaux-Arts with sculptor Charles Raoul Verlet. In 1896, Martin Borgord returned to New York and enrolled in the new Chase School of Art (later renamed the New York School of Art) with William Merritt. In 1899, influential art dealer William Macbeth, dedicated to the cause of promoting American art, represented Borgord in New York.With his friend and fellow artist William Henry Singer...
Category

Early 20th Century Expressionist Portrait Paintings

Materials

Oil

Portrait of a Child Oil on Wood in Gilded Frame Napoleon III era
Located in Pistoia, IT
"Portrait of a little girl" oil on wood signed and dated at upper left "A. Robert 1879" for Alexandre Robert. A Belgian painter of great talent, after studying in Paris and spending...
Category

1870s Academic Portrait Paintings

Materials

Oil

Portrait of a Girl Oil on Canvas Signed in Frame 19th century Belgian School
By Leon Herbo
Located in Pistoia, IT
Léon Herbo (1850-1907), "Portrait of a Girl," oil painting on canvas signed and dated 1884 lower left. In its original gilt frame. With extreme elegance and refinement, Léon Herbo p...
Category

1880s Realist Portrait Paintings

Materials

Oil, Canvas

You May Also Like

Portrait of Carlotta Parisani
Located in Roma, RM
Napoleone Parisani (Camerino 1853 - Rome 1932), Portrait of Carlotta Parisani Oil on canvas 35 x 24 cm with monogram at lower left and lower right, on back: inscribed "A M.r and M.m...
Category

Late 19th Century Other Art Style Portrait Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil

Portrait of a lady
Located in Roma, RM
Napoleone Parisani (Camerino 1853 - Rome 1932), Portrait of a Lady Oil on canvas 42 x 30 cm.
Category

Late 19th Century Other Art Style Portrait Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil

PORTRAIT- Angelo Granati -Figurative Oil on panel painting
By Angelo Granati
Located in Napoli, IT
Portarit - Angelo Granati Italia 2019 - Oil on panel cm.70 x 50. This is his reinterpretation of a greatest old master painting "Portrait de la duchesse de Morny, née princesse Troubetzko "by Franz Xaver Winterhalteri. Franz Xaver Winterhalter was a German painter and lithographer. He worked in numerous European courts, such as Karlsruhe, Paris, London, Prague and Moscow, performing grandiose portraits of rulers, such as the one for King Louis Philippe of France in 1839 (in Versailles) or the one for Queen Victoria with her family in 1842 at Windsor Castle. He also painted three famous portraits of Empress Elisabeth of Austria...
Category

2010s Italian School Interior Paintings

Materials

Oil, Wood Panel

MARTIN-KAVEL Portrait beautiful woman elegant fan realist french 19th
By François Martin-Kavel
Located in PARIS, FR
François MARTIN-KAVEL Paris, 1861 – 1931 Oil on wood panel 24 x 19 cm (33.5 x 27.5 cm with frame) Signed and dated upper left “Martin-Kavel / 85” Beautiful 19th century frame in gild...
Category

1880s Realist Portrait Paintings

Materials

Oil

PORTRAIT OF YOUNG WOMAN - Neapolitan School - Italian Oil On Canvas Painting
By Ciro De Lucia
Located in Napoli, IT
Portrait of Young woman - Ciro De Lucia Italia 2002 - Oil on canvas cm. 50x40. The painting by the painter Ciro De Lucia depicts a portrait of a young woman of the people, he is inspired by Neapolitan painting...
Category

Early 2000s Italian School Portrait Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil

LADY'S PORTRAIT - In the Manner of G. Boldini - Italian Oil on Canvas Painting
By Ciro De Rosa
Located in Napoli, IT
Lady's portrait - Ciro de Rosa Italia 2002 - Oil on canvas cm. 63x47 The painting by Ciro De Rosa portrays a beautiful noblewoman with an elegant and sophisticated dress, he reinterp...
Category

Early 2000s Italian School Portrait Paintings

Materials

Canvas, Oil