![]() ![]() ![]() Many consider him one of the most influential artists in the development and popularization of the neoclassical style of the late 18th century. He was at once an artist, architect, archeologist, designer, collector, and print and antiquities dealer. Piranesi was a multi-talented and accomplished man of the enlightenment who combined supreme artistic ability and historical scholarship with an entrepreneurial business sense. Through these particular works, which were spread all over the Continent by means of the Grand Tour, Piranesi was not only to revolutionize the convention form of the veduta but was to transform the European vision of classical antiquity. The 135 plates of the Vedute di Roma, produced individually by Piranesi from the late 1740s until his death some thirty years later, represent almost every phase in his stylistic evolution and reflect his changing intellectual concerns. Piranesi scholar John Wilton-Ely describes the Vedute as follows: The Vedute is the largest and best known series of the prints Piranesi produced, comprising 135 plates by him and two by his son Francesco Piranesi (Hind, 5). Their lasting popularity is due not only to the picturesque subject matter but Piranesi’s consummate artistry, command of perspective, subtle tonality, and imaginative flair. His Vedute di Roma depicted the great buildings of Rome, from ancient times and the Renaissance to the mid 18th century, when many were in ruins. Giovanni Battista Piranesi was one of the leading figures in the development of the neoclassical style in the 18th century. Despite attempts over the centuries to tear down the tomb and castle and repurpose their materials, they have survived to the present day and remain popular tourist attractions. One of the men is seated on the stone upon which the artist has inscribed the cartouche, his leg casting a shadow on the lettering. As is characteristic of Piranesi, the picturesque ruins are shown in a contemporary 18th century context, with goatherds overseeing grazing animals. As can be seen in this image by Piranesi, it bears an inscription dedicated to “Caecilia Metella, daughter of Quintus Creticus, of Crassus,” a prominent Roman official and the son of a prominent Roman official respectively. The Tomb of Caecilia Metella measures almost 22 meters high overall, with the rotunda almost 30 meters in diameter. This impression of the fifth state was then reissued by the Regia Calcografia, Rome, and bears their blindstamp, lower right. ![]() Previous editions had added “112 XXVI” in the lower right corner and the number 45 to the upper right margin, both of which are still present here. Hind’s definitive catalog of Piranesi’s Vedute, this is the fifth state, issued by Firmin-Didot, Paris, with the number 797 added in the upper right of the image. The structure consists of a cylindrical rotunda atop a square podium with the 14th-century Caetani Castle attached at the rear. The Tomb of Caecilia Metella is a concrete and travertine mausoleum located just outside of Rome on the Appian Way, built during the 1st century BC. Regia Calcografia, Rome: Last Quarter 19th Century ![]()
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