(Naples 1615 - Rome 1673)
Landscape with an arched rock and travellers, oil on canvas, 83 x 132.5 cm, gilded frame

We are grateful to Professora Caterina Volpi for fully endorsing the authenticity of the present work after examination of the painting in the original and for her assistance in compiling the catalogue entry.

The present painting, a highly unusual composition, is one of the most satisfactory works from Salvator Rosa’s early period. It shows three travellers near a river above which looms a ruinous construction. The scene is suffused with the loneliness of untamed nature, uncanny and fascinating at the same time. The landscape, which opens up to a view into the distance on the left, is populated by a convincingly rendered group of picturesque peasants whose physiognomies and postures recur in a set of drawings published by Michael Mahoney (The Drawings of Salvator Rosa, London 1977, 2 vols.). Especially the sheet Rear view of a squatting peasant in a large hat, now in the Gallerie degli Uffizi, Gabinetto dei Disegni e delle Stampe, in Florence (inv. 2207F, Mahoney, vol. II, 3.1C), seems to be directly related to the figure wearing a hat and red jacket on the left side of the group. The big-nosed traveller in a blue coat and hat is reminiscent of similar figures of peasants and fishermen Salvator Rosa studied in his youth (Mahoney, vol. II, no. 3.112). The entire right section of the picture is taken up by a monumental arched rock surrounded by wild vegetation and towered by a ruin. Comparative examples for these details exist as well, such as a sheet from a group of landscape drawings in the British Museum (Fenwick 1946.7.13.1322; Mahoney, vol. II, no. 23.1). It shows the detail of a forest Salvator Rosa might have sketched outdoors, during one of his excursions to the Tuscan countryside. The painting is comparable to Rosa’s compositions from his earliest Florentine period (1640–45), when he worked in the company of Domenico Gargiulo, called Micco Spadaro, with the impact of Neapolitan painting and the Bamboccianti still palpable. One can also detect borrowings from the landscapes of Filippo Napoletano, Salvator Rosa’s countryman, with whom he shared the life of a nomad. Analogies can also be drawn to the following paintings: Marina con arco naturale, Palazzo Pitti, Florence (L. Salerno, Salvator Rosa, l’opera completa, Milan 1975, no. 70), Paesaggio con viandanti, Corham, Methuen Collection (Salerno 1975, no. 38), and Paesaggio con mulino in the same museum (Salerno 1975, no. 42), as well as the ambitious works the artist produced for the Medici family, such as Pace incendia le armi di Firenze, Palazzo Pitti, Florence (Salerno 1975, no. 66), and Allegoria della giustizia tra i pastori, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna (Salerno 1975, no. 67).

We are grateful to Professora Caterina Volpi for fully endorsing the authenticity of the present work after examination of the painting in the original and for her assistance in compiling the catalogue entry. The present painting, a highly unusual composi