Design for a Half Frame Decorated with Angels, Volutes and Garlands.
1634–89
Medium
Pen and brown ink, brush and brown wash over traces of graphite highlighted with white gouache on the upper side of the frame
Dimensions
Sheet: 14 11/16 x 6 9/16 in. (37.3 x 16.6 cm)
Classification
Drawings
Department
Drawings and Prints
Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Credit
The Elisha Whittelsey Collection, The Elisha Whittelsey Fund, 1949
Accession Number
49.19.72
Tags
Art Historical Context
Ciro Ferri (1634–1689), a prominent Italian Baroque artist and collaborator of Pietro da Cortona, this intricate *Design for a Half Frameated with Angels, Vol, and Garlands* as a preparatory drawing. Working in 17th-century Rome and Florence, Ferri excelled frescoes, architecture, and designs, blending dynamic movement withulent ornamentation characteristic of the Baroque style. This sheet captures his vision for an elaborate picture frame, evoking the grandeur of ecclesiastical or palatial interiors where such frames showcased religious paintings or portraits. Rendered in pen and brown ink w...
About the Artist
Ciro Ferri
Ciro Ferri (1634–1689) was an Italian Baroque painter and engraver who served as the principal artistic heir and studio assistant of Pietro da Cortona, the dominant decorative painter of seventeenth-century Rome. Born in Rome, Ferri entered Cortona's workshop as a young man and proved so skilled that he became the master's most trusted collaborator, eventually taking over the completion of major c...