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Allegory on the Life of Canova

Creator

Italian Artist · 1758–1823

Felice Giani's team of artists and craftsmen decorated palaces and public buildings throughout Italy, including Rome, Venice, and Faenza. Sumptuous and richly colored, Giani's distinctive Neoclassical style combined a wealth of antique ornament with wall and ceiling paintings depicting subjects from ancient Greece and Rome. They transformed everything in a room, even the furniture. Giani's preferr

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Date: about 1822–1823
Medium: Black chalk, pen and brown ink, and watercolor
Culture: Italian
Department: Drawings
Institution: Getty Museum

Under a high, coffered dome, numerous mythological figures prepare a monument in honor of the famous Italian sculptor Antonio Canova. Minerva, the goddess of Wisdom, leads Canova toward the cylindrical structure, while the winged figure of Fame, holding a trumpet, tries to crown him with a laurel wreath. In the center, Victory inscribes Canova's name on the monument for two of the most renowned sculptors of Greek antiquity, Phidias and Praxiteles. At the base of the monument, Time unveils Canova's sculpture *Theseus and the Minotaur,* while the figure of Truth leans against it with the light of knowledge on her breast. At the far right, Evil is overcome by the lion, the attribute of Saint Mark and the symbol of Venice, where Canova lived. Felice Giani produced the drawing as a preparatory study for a monument, planned but never built, in honor of Canova. The sculpture was to commemorate the artist, who died in 1822.

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