The world’s most visited museum, the Louvre, is currently presenting the long-term exhibit “Naples in Paris: The Louvre hosts the Museo di Capodimonte” through Jan. 8, 2024. This show features a loan of over 60 artworks from the Neapolitan Museo di Capodimonte, one of Italy’s largest and most significant museums.
This Italian museum has a world-class collection of paintings, drawings, sculptures, and objects d’art that are all housed in a former royal palace on a hill overlooking Naples. Its reconstitution from monarchical home to public museum parallels that of the Louvre, also once a royal residence.
Initially a hunting lodge for Naples’s Bourbon monarchs, the Royal Palace of Capodimonte is currently undergoing major renovations; highlights from its collection are “vacationing” at the Louvre.
Denon Wing
The Museo di Capodimonte’s artworks are being exhibited in three different areas of the Louvre. A core display of 31 paintings are on view in several of the Denon wing’s galleries devoted to Italian painting. Three of the paintings are by the artist Parmigianino, who was born in Parma and became the most influential Mannerist painter (16th-century artistic style characterized by artifice, elongated lines, and elegant grandeur).
Parmigianino’s artistic studies began at home with instruction from his father and uncles. Subsequently, he was influenced by his fellow hometown artist Correggio, along with the work of the High Renaissance old masters Raphael and Michelangelo. In turn, Parmigianino’s expressive and stylish works influenced artists in Italy and throughout Europe, with his art widely disseminated through etchings.
Parmigianino’s ’Antea’
A high point of the Louvre’s presentation is Parmigianino’s eminent and enigmatic painting “Antea.” Considered an Italian masterpiece of female portraiture, much of its backstory remains unknown, including the identity of the model, Parmigianino’s impetus for creating the painting, and even its date.
Scholarly hypotheses have included that the subject was the artist’s daughter, his servant, an aristocratic woman, or a noble bride. However, the current general consensus is that “Antea” is an idealized representation of female beauty—a popular genre of portraiture during the Renaissance. Parmigianino used the image of Antea’s face in other works, which further suggests that she was an ideal facial type he invented and not a specific person.
The woman in “Antea” wears a gold satin dress with silver bands that gently billows, giving a sense of movement. Her intricately detailed attire is embellished by an embroidered apron and cuffs. Jewelry historian Amanda Triossi, in her GemGenève talk “Jewels in Italian Renaissance Paintings,” discusses the pearl earrings the woman wears that are accentuated by her hairstyle, which is also adorned with jewels. Triossi highlights the luxury accessory that cascades down the woman’s shoulder, culminating in her hand. It is a zibellino: a pelt made from ermine, sable or, in this case, marten.
Sully Wing
The second display of “Naples in Paris” takes place in the Sully wing’s Salle de la Chapelle (Sully wing, Level 1). In this space, an eclectic array of paintings, sculptures, and decorative arts are arranged. This grouping includes major works such as Titian’s “Portrait of Pope Paul III and his Grandsons,” Filippo Tagliolini’s complex, large-scale biscuit porcelain group “The Fall of the Giants,” which has been recently restored, and the magnificent “Farnese Casket.”
This casket is considered one of the most precious decorative objects to have been made during the Renaissance, on par with Benvenuto Cellini’s famous golden salt cellar completed for King François I.
“Farnese Casket,” made by Giovanni Bernardi and Florentine silversmith Manno di Bastiano Sbarri, a pupil of Cellini, was commissioned by the great collector Cardinal Alessandro Farnese in 1548. Indeed, much of the core collection of the Museo di Capodimonte can be traced to the acquisitive cardinal and his grandfather, Pope Paul III, who famously commissioned Michelangelo’s “The Last Judgment” fresco in the Sistine Chapel.
Commissioning caskets was especially popular during the Renaissance among European royalty and nobility. Often made from precious metals and inset with engraved rock crystal plaques, many were used as betrothal or wedding gifts.
The Farnese Casket embodies the elegance of Mannerism, creativity, and superb artisanship. Originally, it was used to house precious books and manuscripts, but in 1565 the cardinal gave it to his nephew’s bride as a wedding gift. It is made of gilded silver and richly decorated with embossed and chiseled reliefs both externally and internally, lapis lazuli, and six inset engraved rock crystal ovals of mythological scenes by Bernardi. These crystal plaques are framed by figural representations of the gods Mars, Minerva, Diana, and Bacchus.
Old Master’s Cartoons
The Salle de l'Horloge (Sully wing, Level 2) has a curated display of drawings from the Museo di Capodimonte’s immense total assemblage shown alongside examples from the Louvre’s Cabinet des Dessins (Cabinet of Drawings). Several of the Museo di Capodimonte’s drawings can trace their provenance to the humanist scholar Fulvio Orsini, Cardinal Farnese’s librarian, who had the foresight to value and collect artist drawings.
The foremost ones on view are Michelangelo’s “Group of Soldiers” and Raphael’s “Moses before the Burning Bush.” Both are preparatory cartoons for Vatican decorative commissions and are considered by scholars to be rare surviving drawings from the Renaissance by the hands of the old masters themselves, instead of the work of assistants.
The English word “cartoon” is a translation of the Italian “cartone,” which means large paper. Cartoons are full-size preparatory drawings made for transferring a composition to its final medium, such as a painting or a wall fresco, via pouncing or tracing using charcoal or black chalk.
In Raphael’s exquisite cartoon “Moses before the Burning Bush,” the prophet is depicted calmly crouched in the presence of the Lord. The final fresco was painted on the ceiling of the Room of Heliodorus at the Vatican, Pope Julius II’s private audience room, along with three other Old Testament episodes.
Raphael is part of the trio of High Renaissance masters that include Leonardo and Michelangelo. Both of these older artists greatly influenced his style. Raphael began his studies with his father, like Parmigianino did. When he moved to Florence, he was inspired by the art of Leonardo and Raphael.
Early Raphael cartoons are characterized by precise linear lines, while later works show the influence of Leonardo and Michelangelo. As seen in “Moses before the Burning Bush,” his later cartoons are more concerned with poses that use tonal modeling techniques like Michelangelo’s, such as chiaroscuro (light-dark) and sfumato (gradual shading to create hazy forms) like Leonardo.
One of the goals of the “Naples in Paris” exhibit is to raise the profile of the Museo di Capodimonte. Pompeii and Herculaneum often monopolize a tourist’s itinerary, and many who visit Naples are unaware of the museum and its treasures. “Naples in Paris” serves to correct this unfamiliarity, along with providing the Louvre’s visitors an exhilarating and diverse art experience that conveniently requires only one trip to a museum.
