Marco Boschini. The Epic of Venetian Painting in Baroque Europe. ZeL Publishers, 2014

Translation by Francesco Mazzaferro
CLICK HERE FOR ITALIAN VERSION

Marco Boschini. 

L’epopea della pittura veneziana nell’Europa barocca
[The Epic of Venetian Painting in Baroque Europe]

Edited by Enrico Maria Dal Pozzolo,
with the cooperation by Paolo Bertelli

Treviso, ZeL Publishers, 2014

Pietro Bellotti, Portrait of Marco Boschini
(engraving by Marco Boschini published in the Carta del navegar pitoresco)
Source http://www.isaventuri.it/BIBLIOTECA%20STORICA/S.Pietro_Patrimonio%20disperso/2_BOSCHINI.html

[N.B. On Marco Boschini see in this blog also: Marco Boschini, The charter of pictorial navigation. Edizione critica con la “Breve Instruzione” premessa alle “Ricche Minere della Pittura Veneziana”, Edited by Anna Pallucchini, Istituto per la collaborazione culturale Venezia-Roma, 1966; Marco Boschini, The pictorial jewels. Virtuous ornamentation of the town of Vicenza; i.e. the index of all public paintings of the same town, Edited by Waldemar H. de Boer, Centro Di, 2008]

A suggestion

We suggest you read this piece after the (much more authoritative) review that Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti wrote in 1967, in occasion of the publication of the critical edition of the Carta del navegar pitoresco (Charter of Pictorial Navigation), curated by Anna Pallucchini, and already published in this blog.

Frontispiece of th Carta del Navegar Pitoresco
Source: http://www.isaventuri.it/BIBLIOTECA%20STORICA/S.Pietro_Patrimonio%20disperso/2_BOSCHINI.html

Marco Boschini between Italian and Venetian language

The volume contains the proceedings of a conference held in Verona between 19th and 20th June 2014 on the same topic.

Rarely a title has made so clear the idea of ​​the organizers, i.e. to take stock of the work of Marco Boschini, a key representative of Venetian art literature of the seventeenth century, placing him in a European context and in the cultural milieu in which he was growing: the Baroque. To be honest, to link him with the European culture of the time seems to be a work stream yet to be fully explored. It is true that the masterpiece of Boschini, or the Carta del navegar pitoresco (1660) is dedicated to the Archduke Leopold Wilhelm of Austria, the legendary collector of the seventeenth-century, and that a few months after the publication Boschini receives (as usual at the time) some major awards from the House of Austria; but this is rather an attempt of the Venetian writer and merchant to gain the favor of a customer at the highest level, as an outlet for the sale of the works of art to which Boschini himself devotes attention. Likewise, for example, the dedication that Carlo Cesare Malvasia addressed to Louis XIV in his Felsina Pittrice (Bologna Painter), just 18 years later, has a "tactical" value of the greatest importance, since it is aimed to find, in the French cultural world, a counterpart legitimating the importance of the Bolognese artistic school against the supposed superiority of the Florentine and Roman ones.

There is no doubt whatsoever, to the contrary, that Boschini is an integral part of the Baroque culture, starting with the literary form chosen to write his Carta del navegar pitoresco, an overwhelming poem in rhymed quatrains of the type ABBA, written exclusively in Venetian. To trace back Boschini to the Baroque culture has however not always been taken for granted. Rightly Giuliana Tomasella in Il recupero di Boschini nella critica moderna (The revival of Boschini in modern critics) noted that such a revival took place in Italy as from the years after World War I, still in the light of the substantially negative judgment issued by Benedetto Croce towards the Baroque. Therefore, Boschini was preferably lauded for his anti-classicism, his anti-intellectualism, the spontaneity of his verse and language, as opposed to the rampant pro-Florentinism from Vasari onwards. The section of the book exploring the aspects and literary influences, which can somehow relate to the Carta, is really highly interesting. Piermario Vescovo, for example, in Nave pitoresca (Pictorial Ship) cannot help but notice an objective fact: while in other works of cataloging or historiography nature, namely Le Minere della pittura (The mines of Painting) (1664) and the Ricche Minere della pittura (Rich Mines of Painting) (1674), Boschini chooses to speak in Italian, for the Carta he adopts indeed Venetian. "If we look at the entire history of the literary use of the Venetian - writes Vescovo - the most important reason resides as to the Carta [...] in the fact that “dialect” functions better than "language” where the narrative involves the “natural“ substance of “day-to-day language." [...] Boschini narrates the Venetian "painting", especially in its physical execution, through a dialect which also contains a sectorial terminology, with specialized terms on things or processes, techniques and effects, but starting from the materiality of the execution, not from an external and "literary" vision. Evidently, it is the day-to-day language through which experience was communicated in the "workshops", from master to apprentice, but which was also widespread in the circuits of art "experts" and "specialists", exactly the universe where Boschini is active" (pp. 100-101). Not only and not so much a “policy” choice, but a language requirement.

Engraving by Marco Boschini in the Carta del Navegar Pitoresco: Mercury introducing Painting to Juppiter
Source: http://www.isaventuri.it/BIBLIOTECA%20STORICA/S.Pietro_Patrimonio%20disperso/2_BOSCHINI.html

The Regatta

The same language requirement may be found in other minor writings of Boschini. One of these is La regata unico cimento maritimo a l’uso venezian (The regatta, the unique maritime competition in Venetian practice), a poem he also wrote in the Venetian language in 1670. It is one of the many surprises that this valuable work offers us. Daria Perocco, who curated the critical edition in 2006, writes about it (Daria Perocco, “Con un remo in liogo de penelo”: la regata di Marco Boschini" - "With an oar instead of a brush": the regatta of Marco Boschini"). In this poem Boschini describes what we now call "historical regatta", and at the time was a social event, often offered to distinguished foreign visitors who did not fail however to contribute to the organization, by donating cash prizes for the winners of the various categories (there was also a race reserved for women). Somehow, painting is always involved there. Boschini imagines crossing the area of the race on a vessel that hosts two precious traveling companions: "Curiosity" and "Painting". The latter is given the most important place, the stern, where normally the gondolier is rowing and gives direction to the boat. And it is no coincidence that describing how Venetians row, i.e. standing with only one oar, Marco operates a delicious parallel with the Venetian painters, who, in fact, demonstrate the highest skills in painting and know how to use the brush as the racers use the oar: «Come xe in man de sti Popieri el remo, cusì el penel xe in man dei Veneziani»" (As these racers hold the oar in their hand, likewise the Venetians use the brush) (p. 120).

The Carta del Navegar Pitoresco: the Eight Wind
Source: http://www.isaventuri.it/BIBLIOTECA%20STORICA/S.Pietro_Patrimonio%20disperso/2_BOSCHINI.html

The Modern Gallery

If the choice of the Venetian in the Carta is determined by language needs, it does not seem, however, that the reasons why the poem was rediscovered and praised in the twentieth century are totally agreeable. For example, it is questionable that the work gives free rein to the fantasy and imagination of the poet, eschewing the intellectualism of the world of the Academies. Linda Borean in “Per dover far moderna Galaria”. Marco Boschini e gli artisti del suo tempo ("To produce a modern Gallery". Marco Boschini and the artists of his time) dwells with the analysis of the last two "Winds", the Seventh and the Eighth ones (a "Wind" can be considered as the equivalent of a “canto” in Dante Alighieri’s epic poem Divine Comedy; therefore, the Winds make up the Charter). The Seventh Wind contains a eulogy of living painters (including the most popular foreign artists who were dominating the collectors' market in Venice), leading later on in the Eighth Wind to a "moderna Galaria" (modern gallery) which proposes a series of drawings commissioned by Boschini, which he also transformed in the form of etching (see also Francesca Bisaccia, Boschini incisore - Boschini engraver). Clearly, the influence of the Galleria (Gallery) by Giambattista Marino is evident. And it is equally clear that it is a sort of cautiously pondered "catalogue" that Boschini, as "specialist" and intermediary of artwork, intends to offer to the readers of the work, i.e. to the class of Venetian (and non-Venetian) aristocrats with a passion for painting. Marco intends to offer them his services as trusted advisor (see about it Enrico Maria Dal Pozzolo, Le maschere dell’Eccellenza - Masks of Excellence).

Marco Boschini, The Carta del Navegar Pitoresco, Eighth Wind: the double-page dedicated to Daniel Van Den Dyck.
(In the engraving: Juppiter embellishing Virtue with a royal mantle)
Source: http://www.isaventuri.it/BIBLIOTECA%20STORICA/S.Pietro_Patrimonio%20disperso/2_BOSCHINI.html

It is not possible, for reasons of space, to make a more detailed review. However, it is our duty to report other ‘delicacies’ that you can enjoy in the volume. I am talking for example of the pages dedicated to the Regia terena de i dei (The earthly royal palace of gods), another poem dedicated this time to the description, of course in laudatory terms, of the residence that the Gonzaga family had erected as a place of delight in Maderno, in Garda Lake (see Paolo Bertelli, Boschini e la villa di Maderno. Appunti sulla Regia terena de i dei - Boschini and the villa in Maderno. Notes on The earthly royal palace of gods). I also refer to the possibility offered to admire the whole engraving work by Boschini, thanks to the Atlas edited by Francesca Bisaccia (which also reports on his interests as a cartographer). And I would like to conclude with the first modern transcription of the notes made by Pier Antonio Novelli (1729-1804) for the preparation of a biography of Boschini. The transcription of the manuscript, now preserved at the Library of the Patriarchal Seminary of Venice, is curated by Loredana Olivato and Lionello Puppi. The editors do not make an attempt to define the date. I think it is important to compare these notes with the several handwritten notes written by Peter Edwards (who was one generation older than Novelli: 1744-1822). [1] Well, if Novelli dwells long and mostly on the Carta, Edwards never takes into account Boschini for his poem, which he must of course have read, and remembers him rather insistently for the Minere (Mines) and for the Ricche Minere (Rich mines). I do not think this happens by coincidence, but it is the choice of an artist who clearly does not share anymore the "baroque" approach to art advocated in the Carta.

Marco Boschini, The Carta del Navegar Pitoresco. Eighth Wind
Eloquence crowning Painting (after Carlo Ridolfi)
Source: http://www.isaventuri.it/BIBLIOTECA%20STORICA/S.Pietro_Patrimonio%20disperso/2_BOSCHINI.html

 A flaw

We mentioned the Minere and the Ricche Minere. We return now to report what, in our view, is a flaw of the volume.

The main works of Boschini are three: the Carta del Navegar Pitoresco (Charter of pictorial navigation) (1660), Le minere della pittura veneziana (The mines of Venetian painting) (1664, in Italian) and Le ricche minere della pittura veneziana (Rich mines of Venetian painting) (1674, in Italian), which is in fact an extension of the text published ten years earlier. Among the enhancements provided Le ricche minere stands the insertion of the Breve instruzione per intender in qualche modo le maniere de gli Auttori Veneziani (Short instruction to somehow understand the manners of the Venetian authors), whose purpose is to outline the evolution of the style of the artists from the lagoon town. Well, Minere and Ricche Minere are objectively neglected, in the book we are reviewing. On them Enrico Maria Dal Pozzolo only writes on p. 11 (contrasting them to the Carta): "the two guides recorded - in a neutral, widespread, and systematic manner - the artistic heritage that made unique the lagoon city." That's all. Some citation is made to the Short Instruction, but always in relation to the Carta. However, a strengthened bond exists since the critical edition conducted by Anna Pallucchini and published in 1966. On that occasion Pallucchini included, together with the Carta, the text of the Short Instruction, effectively creating a "new work" enclosing all pages of art criticism by Boschini. But we must not and we can not forget that the original placement of the Short Instruction is within the Ricche Minere. We would have honestly expected at least an essay dedicated to the production of the Venetian guides. We do not believe that this aspect has been underestimated by the curators of the conference; probably the choices were made on the basis of specific conditions. We would like to reiterate, however, that without his guides Boschini is not the "complete" Boschini. One element to be kept in mind.

NOTES

[1] On the unpublished manuscripts of Pietro Edwards, I would like to refer to my Le Belle Arti a Venezia nei manoscritti di Pietro e Giovanni Edwards. Con l’edizione critica del Repertorio Generale delle Venete Belle Arti (The Fine Arts in Venice in the manuscripts of Pietro and Giovanni Edwards. With the critical edition of the Repertory of Venetian Fine Arts), to be published by GoWare Publishers in Florence.