(Feldkirch 1664–1736 Milan)
A cobbler and a woman cutting a child’s hair,
oil on canvas, 88.5 x 118.5 cm, framed

Provenance:
Private collection, Milan

We are grateful to Maria Silvia Proni for confirming the attribution and for cataloguing this lot.

Giacomo Francesco Cipper called Todeschini was born in Austria but lived in Lombardy; during recent decades the revaluation of his reputation has restored him to a place of importance among the genre painters of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and as a key figure linking the Dane, Eberhard Keilau (1621–1687) who lived in Italy, with the Lombard, Giacomo Ceruti (1698–1767) known for the sensitivity of his pictures. Cipper is documented as arriving in Milan as early as 1696. Here, he was to manage a studio that attained such success as to have copyists and imitators; he was favoured by Milan’s intellectual sphere, and considering that he continued to identify himself as ‘todesco’ he also received the patronage of the Austrian nobility present in the Lombard capital.

Cipper reveals himself a faithful chronicler of the poor: he describes everyday stories without heroes or great achievements, without dapper noblemen or flirtatious dames, free of cultured classical references – in short he depicts stories of common people facing the difficulties of life with calm dignity, with irony and with a smile of acceptance.

The present painting describes an everyday scene of ordinary, but real, people. They occupy a time and place entirely typical of Todeschini, where life consists of an unfolding of routine events, and work is conducted with calm concentration, through familiarly repeated actions. The cobbler is dressed in a dignified manner, his wool hat lowered over his head, his leather apron protecting his doublet, as he turns his head attentively to sow the sole of a boot with a gesture which reoccurs in other similar scenes, such as the canvas depicting A Cobbler in a private collection (see W. Arslan, Del Todeschini e di qualche pittore affine, in: Arte, vol. 4, 1934, p. 271, fig. 14) or The Cobbler (also called Ciabattino e donna che lavora a maglia [Cobbler with a woman knitting]), also in a private collection (see L. Tognoli, G. F. Cipper, il ‘Todeschini’, Bergamo 1976, p. 44, fig. 41). Meanwhile the woman in the present painting looks out at the viewer as she cuts the smiling child’s hair. The subject of hair care reoccurs in other compositions such as An old woman cuts the hair of a youth with card players in a private collection, Brescia (see F. Arisi, G. F. Cipper ‘il Todeschini’, in: Arte lombarda, vol. 49, 1978, pp. 115–120): here, a cross-section of ordinary poverty is rendered with all the lightness of touch of a fully invested chronicler, transcribing the reality in which he participates.

The three figures are rendered with the easy sureness of hand and thought of a painter who is fully the master of his means of expression, the cobbler’s tools – the pliers, awl, hammer, mould and leather knife (which also appear in the above mentioned Cobbler with a woman knitting) are casually laid out in the box containing them which is positioned in the foreground of the picture, unexpectedly becoming an independent still-life passage. The box is presented with apparent nonchalance, the everyday objects being positioned precisely, in the light, heightening our sense of their various materials, the hardness of the metal surfaces and the softer forms of the wooden handles, all achieved with the skill of the most renowned still-life specialists.

The especially dense application of pigments, the rendering of the figure’s features, the colour harmonies – especially notable in the vermilion of the woman’s shawl, the child’s shirt sleeves and the cobbler’s arms, emphasised by the opening onto a blue sky, streaked with cloud – as well as the size of the canvas – are all features that point to this painting belonging to the first years of the eighteenth century. Indeed, it is comparable to the Old spinner and card players in a private collection (see M. S. Proni, Giacomo Francesco Cipper detto il ‘Todeschini’, Soncino 1994, p. 50, no. 7) and to other paintings of similar subject such as The Charlatan at the Chateau de Rajec, Brno, all depicting, as usual, three people seated round a table.