Description

Mario Nuzzi known as Mario de ‘Fiori (Rome, 1603 – Rome 1673)

Landscape couple with flower crown
Oil painting on canvas.

Mario de ‘Fiori’s successful production is linked both to his biography and to his taste for contemporary still life painting with flowers. Nephew of the famous Caravaggist Tommaso Salini, he trained in Rome in his uncle’s shop and on his death he inherited the large number of customers, who rely on him for his extraordinary expertise as a florist, also gained in the light of the activity of floriculturist of his father Sixtus.
Inheritance from his uncle also appears to be the bond that the painter has with Cassiano dal Pozzo, who was for him an important intermediary for the knowledge of international artists of his contemporaries, but above all for the patrons of the Barberini court; in 1634 he appears in the registers of the Academy of San Luca and since 1646 he is among the virtuosos of the Pantheon.
This pair of wreaths with rural landscape and figures probably belongs to the first phase of the artist’s production, a phase of research and experimentation. The brushstroke is decisive, not very analytical, almost expressionistic; this pendant is characterized by a rare dark background, not belonging to the artist’s maturity, still not very sensitive to the lively and luminous taste of the full Baroque.

Bibl.: L. Salerno, ‘La natura morta italiana’, Roma 1984. p. 177.

Our reference: A05193