Cerchia di Pietro Longhi (1701 – 1785)

Circle of Pietro Longhi, born Pietro Falca (Venice, 1701 – 1785) Concert Scene Oil on canvas, 65 x 85 cm 18th-century frame, 78 x 97 cm The examined painting depicts a scene of a domestic concert, enlivened by various characters gathered in an environment lacking precise spatial connotations, distinguished by the presence of a portal with a sculpted frame and a central table, around which musicians and onlookers are arranged. The painting is clearly attributable to the close circle of Pietro Longhi (1701-1785); the work, in fact, bears a traditional attribution to the Venetian painter, also reiterated on the label at the center of the frame. The canvas could well be included in the group of compositions in which the author describes and interprets the daily life that takes place in Venetian homes, according to an illustrative strand peculiar to his nature as a refined narrator. In these paintings, highly appreciated by the aristocracy and intellectuals of the time, seductive episodes of lower or upper Venetian society were narrated, immersed in their daily lives, fully responding to the enlightened desire to investigate reality and to propose a punctual chronicle of the social customs of the time.