Publisher's Synopsis
The Italian painter Alessandro Magnasco (1667-1749) depicted religious communities as diverse as Jews, Christians, Quakers and Pagan people in his religious pictures. The author examines the sources of inspiration for his pictures, the role of the collectors of the time and which rites and what motivation achieved pictorial worth . For the first time, this volume decodes the "religious pictures" by the Italian painter Alessandro Magnasco (1667-1749) from the transition from the late baroque to the rococo as pictorial arguments for religious discourse. The paintings were dedicated to depicting religious practices of such diverse faith communities as the Jews, Christians - including Quakers - but also the Pagan and popular superstitions. Under the aspects of iconography, pendant formation and contemporary reception, Charlotte Mende examines why certain religious rites achieved pictorial worth. Which sources of inspiration caused Magnasco's idiosyncratic pictorial inventions and how did the collectors of the time deal with them?
