Attributed to Margarita Caffi

Attributed to MARGARITA CAFFI (ca. 1650 - Milan, 1710).
"Vase".
Provenance: Apartment mansion belonging to a family of the Catalan bourgeoisie of long tradition.
Oil on canvas. Relined.
This lot makes set with the 35353928.
Measurements: 82 x 62 cm; 102 x 80 cm (frame).

The subject of the vase, presented frontally on a simple support surface, is a basic iconographic model in the evolution of the Italian still life, from the still mannerist "Vasi a grottesche" to the creations of the illustrious masters of the genre of the seventeenth century. The vases in tender, attributed to Margherita Caffi, house an exuberant bouquet composed of various flowers (roses, carnations, daffodils and lilies). It stands out for being worked with a dynamic enveloping rhythm, and reveals both an intense volumetric tension and a brilliant chromaticism that, well balanced with the light contrast, is characteristic of these Florentine baroque compositions.

Margherita or Margarita (as she was called in Spain) Caffi was a Baroque painter specialized and appreciated for her still lifes, in which she mainly used fruits and flowers. Despite the few data of her life that, so far, have been discovered, she could have been born in Vicenza (she signs some works as coming from this city) or in Venice or Cremona (according to other sources). Her father, Vicenzo Volò, was a painter specializing in still lifes who probably began Margarita's training; she married in Cremona another still life painter of flowers, Francisco Ludovico Caffi, from whom she takes her surname.
He developed his work, prolific, between Lombardy and Veneto in Italy, with commissions from the Grand Dukes of Tuscany, the Medici, the Spanish Court, etc.. He probably knew Flemish masters, but he always maintained his own style, characterized by his light brushstrokes, his lively touches on somber backgrounds, etc. Although he settled in Piacenza in 1670, at the end of his life, in Milan, he managed to create a rich school specialized in still lifes.
His work is preserved only in a few private collections around the world, as well as in prominent institutions such as the Prado Museum and the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando (both in Madrid), the "Museo de Bodegones" (Museo della Natura Morta) of the Villa Medici in Poggio a Caiano in Italy, the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, etc.