Benigno Bossi

After completing his apprenticeship in Nuremberg and Dresden, the painter, stuccoist and engraver, Benigno Bossi, was offered an appointment in Parma in 1760 by Duke Ferdinand of Bourbon and became an academy professor there in 1766. The present series, which is of particular interest in the light of its almost boundless, anarchic idiosyncrasy and Arcimboldesque diversity of shapes and forms, arose after designs by Ennemond Alexandre Petitot (1727 Lyon – 1801 Parma), an architect and a pupil of Soufflot, who served under the Duke of Parma from 1753 and was a pioneer of classicism in the city.

The first four prints in the series depict classical ornamental vases of the kind that Petitot designed for the ducal gardens in Parma. In the remaining prints Petitot surpasses himself with pictorial creations of extraordinary originality in which traditional motifs, such as genii, satyrs and nymphs, are interspersed with a wide range of creatures – insects, elephants, lions and tortoises, for example – presented in decorative ornamental shapes. This gives rise to some highly evocative, arresting pictorial inventions, for instance two bizarre grasshoppers clinging to a classical-style urn and a humorous depiction of yawning male heads swallowing the handle of a strange scaly vase.

Petitot may well have derived inspiration from Jacques François Joseph Saly’s series of vase prints that was published in Rome in 1746 (Vasa a se inventa atque studii causa delin. et incisa) and he was probably also greatly influenced by the world of forms to be found in Edme Bouchardon’s work. While that may be the case, Petitot’s designs nonetheless reveal a markedly independent approach and a wealth of creative imagination. In artistic respects Benigno Bossi’s absolutely ingenious, consummately executed etchings are in no way inferior to the designs by Petitot on which they are based. The complete series in the first state on offer here is of eminent rarity, only a few impressions having survived. Superb, even and contrasting impressions of outstanding beauty, printed on the full sheet. Probably in the original, marbled half-leather binding. Minor ageing, otherwise in mint condition.

24.000 €