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Giovanni Paolo Panini
The Colosseum and the Arch of Constantine, 1736
Giovanni Paolo Panini, a professor at the French Academy in Rome, was a distinguished painter of views of ancient and modern Italian monuments not only as situated but also rearranged according to his imagination. Both types of scenes were popular souvenirs among aristocratic tourists, and the latter, known as capricci, or fantasies, were especially prized for their combination of realism and invention. This picturesque view of the Colosseum and the Arch of Constantine is one of a group of about 20 such fantastic views.
In this capriccio, Panini has also included the first-century BC pyramid tomb of Gaius Cestius in the distance (it is actually located in another section of Rome). He has also placed several well-known ancient works of art in the foreground. These included the Borghese Warrior, a statue of a gladiator named for the collection to which it belonged at the time; the Dying Gaul, from the capitoline Museum in Rome: and a fragment of an ancient mosaic discovered in Rome in the 17th century and now in Madrid. |