Alessandro Sanquirico (Milan, 1777-1849)
Four theatrical scenes and a view of Milan
watercolor on paper, (5) cm 6.5 x 8- With frame: (4) cm 11 x 12; (1) cm 16 x 18
signed lower right "A Sanquirico"
These five sophisticated miniatures executed in watercolor are the work of Alessandro Sanquirico and represent some stage designs he created for the Teatro alla Scala and the Teatro Carcano between 1827 and 1832, a period in which the artist was an absolute protagonist of the Scala scene, as well as a view of the ephemeral monument erected in 1835 to commemorate the death of the then Habsburg emperor Francis I. Made with great technical skill and a peculiar attention to detail, the five small miniatures illustrate: The backdrop for the first scene of the first act of the drama The Last Day of Pompeii by Giovanni Pacini, brought to the stage of La Scala for the first time in the autumn of 1827. The watercolor in question is of particular interest since the corresponding engraving appears within a volume presenting the sets of the Last Day of Pompeii, published in a very limited number of copies in Milan in 1829. The backdrop for the second scene of the first act of the drama The Last Day of Pompeii by Giovanni Pacini: the scene depicts the passage of the drama's characters from Porta Nolana. Also, the engraving corresponding to the scene of the Passaggio da porta Nolana is present in the 1829 volume.
The backdrop for a scene from the famous drama La Norma by Vincenzo Bellini, in the unpublished version staged at La Scala during the Carnival of 1832. The scene depicts the Temple of Irminsul, a god sacred to the Gauls, who, in the scene represented on this occasion, vigorously celebrate the liberation from Roman rule in the place of worship.
The set design for the last scene of Anna Bolena, a historical drama performed at the Teatro Carcano in Milan in 1831. In the tragic final scene of the story, the one depicted here, the violent death of the second consort of the British king Henry VIII is staged. The Memorial for the August Emperor Francis II: is a neo-Gothic style shrine erected in 1835 to commemorate the death of the sovereign, occurred in March of that year.
Alessandro Sanquirico was born in Milan on July 27, 1777, in the contrada del Bocchetto, the current area around Piazza Cordusio. The ground floor of his birthplace housed the Caffè Sanquirico, successfully run by his Piedmontese father Ambrogio, and his Milanese mother Marianna Grassi. He studied at the Brera Academy of Fine Arts at the time led by Giuseppe Piermarini, Leopoldo Pollack, Giuliano Traballesi, Giuseppe Franchi and Martino Knoller. After completing his training at the Brera Academy, the artist worked, as far as the first phase of his career is concerned, mainly as a fresco artist. In 1805 he participated in the front line in the design and decoration of the ephemeral apparatus for the Milanese celebrations on the occasion of the coronation of Napoleon as King of Italy (May 26). In view of the entry into Milan of the viceroy Eugenio di Beauharnais, in the company of his consort Augusta Amalia of Bavaria (February 12, 1806), Sanquirico painted the fictitious triumphal arch designed by Luigi Cagnola at Porta Riconoscenza (the current Porta Venezia). The political changes and the sunset of the Napoleonic epic did not mark, for Sanquirico, the end of a career successfully started at the time of the republican festivals. On the contrary, his activity, especially as far as the field of theatrical scenography is concerned, a true specialty of the Milanese painter, intensified to such an extent as to make him the primary artistic reference in the Habsburg era. Among the main admirers of the artist was in fact the Habsburg emperor Francis II, who during his Milanese stay assiduously frequented La Scala to attend the shows signed by Sanquirico, around the 10s of the nineteenth century often flanked by Giovanni Perego. Dutiful and pragmatic, since 1817, the year of the premature death of Perego, Sanquirico obtained the assignment of signing scenes, machines and decorations of the entire production of the Teatro alla Scala. For three lustrums (1817-32) the artist was the absolute protagonist of the Scala scene, giving the works and ballets a spectacular scenic face. A deep connoisseur of styles, he alternated on stage the Gothic, the medieval, the Renaissance, and then the Orient, Egypt, Russia, with ease of hand and rigor equal to the imagination. His stylistic signature was affirmed with clarity: harmony of spaces, dilated to the unbelievable through vertiginous perspectives. Sanquirico's ability to graduate the chromatism on the canvases was remarked by Stendhal, spectator at the Scala of a ballet created by the choreographer Salvatore Viganò. Acclaimed by public and critics, Sanquirico staged a vast and varied repertoire of works and ballets by authors now forgotten and composers then passed into history. For Gioachino Rossini he signed the world premiere of the Gazza ladra (May 31, 1817). At La Scala, Gaetano Donizetti and Vincenzo Bellini competed for the honors and had the same set designer: Sanquirico. The classic style of Sanquirico became a fashion and a guarantee of quality for small and large theaters that competed for the artist both for the scenography and for the renewal of the decorations of the halls: the Re theater in Milan (1822), the Concordia theater in Cremona and again the Comunitativo theater in Piacenza (1827), the Teatro di Varese (1830), the Teatro Sociale in Bergamo (1830). The most heartfelt commitment of the artist was the extreme homage to the Emperor Francis II, who died in Vienna on March 2, 1835. Sanquirico designed in a short time a sarcophagus in Gothic style placed in the Duomo, guarded by eight sleeping lions (the strength of the winner of Napoleon) and the representations of Justice, Temperance, Prudence and Constancy (work of Pompeo Marchesi), and surmounted by the representation of Faith. After almost 50 years of artistic activity, Sanquirico died in Milan on March 13, 1849, at the age of 71. His name is remembered at the Monumental Cemetery of Milan among the "well-known and deserving citizens".