MUNARI, Cristoforo

In this painting, on a table draped in red cloth, a busy composition shows off music and earthly delights - watermelon, biscuits, wine - under the gaze, as it were, of a clock that materialises the passage of time. The painting could contain an allusion to the five senses, and even Vanity: the clock dominates a composition in which the eye can gaze at appetizing objects, evoking smell and taste, hearing (the violin), touch (with the red material acting as tablecloth), and indeed sight, if we consider the painting as a whole. The artist indulges in the play of forms, of alternating voids and solids, of vanishing perspectives that animate the composition; and books, open or closed, serve as a support for the violin and bow.

This still-life depicts a large cabbage in the centre and around it ham, pumpkin, earthenware and a plate with knife. It is a mature painting by the artist executed in his Florentine period when he worked for the Medici court and local nobility.

A clear light cuts through the details of the composition with the cleanness of a photograph. The whole subject has been studied with millimetric precision, as seen in the pentimento, evident in the depiction of the melon, made smaller so as not to be too invasive. The framing is diagonal and places the edge of the chest in the foreground. The two books in the opposite corners and the velvet cloth with golden studs direct the gaze towards other depths, with the flat, dark background representing a point for comparison.

The painter has chosen a mix of subjects: ripe fruit of the season on a silver plate, citrus fruits corresponding to the Medici’s botanical preferences, ultra-fine crystals, polished, fine blue and white porcelain, and books that allude to the constant pleasure of reading. Of these, the book on the stand with the savoiardi biscuits has a parchment bookmark carrying the artist’s signature: a nonchalant trompe-l’oeil effect that is his recognized specialty, and which is repeated in the peeled lemon, dropping over the side of the table.

Cristoforo Munari became famous in Rome because of his still-lifes, with their varied, carefully chosen subjects, often described with a fine, crystalline light. His iconography has its roots in Emilian painting, with generous space given to musical instruments and sheet music, mingled freely with fruits and domestic utensils, the whole sometimes enlivened by an animal presence.

Cristoforo Munari is an artist of much-vaunted elegance who refined his repertory in Rome under the Nordic still-life artists after training in Emilia – including the German painter Christian Berentz – and stands out due to his closer adherence to reality, including in his differentiated, camouflage painting effect, adjusted to the truth of the materials. He came into contact with the Grand Prince of Tuscany, Ferdinando de’ Medici, first in letters from Rome, then in Florence where, in 1706, he enrolled at the Florentine Academy of Drawing, showing his activity in the Grand Duchy, which saw him in the service of the Medici family, as well as of other collectors. With the early death of Ferdinando, Munari’s fortune gradually faded, leaving him to end his days in poverty and dedicating himself above all to restoration.