(Romeno 1751–1830 Vienna)
Portrait of the Emperor of Austria, Francis I; and Portrait of the Empress of Austria, Maria Theresa of Naples and Sicily,
one signed bottom left, on the base of the column: Lampi fecit,
oil on canvas, each 76 x 61 cm, a pair, framed (2)

Exhibited:
Trento, Mart – Museo di Arte Moderna e Contemporanea, 25 June – 31 October 2004

Literature:
R. Pancheri, Giovanni Battista Lampi, in: Il secolo dell’Impero. Principi artisti e borghesi tra il 1815 e il 1915, ed. by G. Belli, A. Tiddia, exhibition catalogue, Milan 2004, pp. 106-109, ill.

The painting depicts the Emperor of Austria, Francis I, in his uniform as supreme commander of the army, with his commander’s staff held in his right hand and his gaze proudly turned to the distance. On the white uniform, hemmed with gold braiding, is the principal insignia of the Austrian army: the Orders of Maria Teresa and Saint Stephen of Hungary, and the cross of the Knights of the Teutonic Order. A watered silk sash across the breast displays the colours of Austria, and the Order of the Golden Fleece stands out on his breast, suspended from a diamond-studded broach.

The solution of showing the monarch in dress uniform goes back to the period of the Napoleonic wars, which saw the House of Austria almost constantly engaged in exhausting military campaigns of varying success until the final victory at Waterloo. The portrait reflects the sovereign in a heroic light, drawing a connection with an iconographic line that was widespread until the Congress of Vienna, one that ‘lives in the paintings of Kreutzinger, or of Lampi, or in the miniatures of Füger, or in the mezzotints of Kininger and Pichler’ (L. Grünstein, Das Alt-Wiener Anlitz. Bildnisse und Menschen aus der ersten Hälfte des XIX. Jahrhunderts, Vienna 1931, I, p. 5).

Over the course of his more than forty years of reign, Emperor Francis posed for several portraits by Lampi and his son Giovanni Battista junior, in a series of works of an official nature disseminated throughout the provinces of the monarchy (for an initial census, see R. Pancheri, I Lampi e gli Asburgo-Lorena, un vincolo di fedeltà attraverso tre generazioni, in Un ritrattista nell’Europa delle corti. Giovanni Battista Lampi 1751-1830, F. Mazzocca, ed. by R. Pancheri, A. Casagrande, exhibition catalogue, Trento 2001, pp. 94-115). Among the paintings attributed to the elder Lampi, is the painting in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, now at the Austrian embassy in London, characterized by a similar wooded background (see R. Pancheri, ibid. pp.103, 106-107, fig. 112); the portrait sold at Dorotheum on 7th May 2003, together with the pendant depicting the sovereign’s third wife, Maria Ludovika of Austria-Este. The painting, which shows the Emperor seated at his desk, acquired by the Austrian Government, appeared in the Canova exhibition at Bassano del Grappa (M. Guderzo, in: Canova, ed. by S. Androsov, M. Guderzo, G. Pavanello, exhibition catalogue, Milan 2003, pp. 146-147, cat. I.20).

The absence of a signature suggests that a possible intervention by Giovanni Battista junior, who shared the running of the studio with his father from 1804, cannot be excluded. However the skillful use of chiaroscuro and the uncommonly precise rendering of the details, in particularly the gems encrusted on the staff and the insignia of the Order of the Golden Fleece, appear typical of the virtuoso manner customary to the elder Lampi.

The daughter of Ferdinand I, King of the Two Sicilies, Maria Theresa was born in Naples on 6 June 1772. She married the future Emperor, Francis, in 1790, when he was still an Archduke and a widower of just six months, following the death of Duchess Elisabeth of Württemberg. The union yielded twelve offspring, who would assure the future lineage of the House of Austria: among these was the heir to the throne, Ferdinand, and the Archduchess Marie Louise, future wife of Napoleon. Little integrated into the environment of the Viennese court, Maria Theresa spoke fluent Italian and French, but relatively little German, she lived out of the way, in the shadow of her husband. She died in Vienna on 13 April 1807. The present portrait signed bottom left on the base of the column, depicts her in half-profile, turned three-quarters to the right with a benevolent gaze directed toward the observer. The Empress, then little more than thirty years old, is seated in an open loggia, her arms folded on a red cushion that ends with a showy golden tassel. She wears a lacy gown and a coronet, from which hangs a teardrop pearl, while an ermine cloak falls softly from her shoulders. In accordance with a format commonly employed in Neoclassicism, we discern the base of a column, partly obscured by a curtain. The artist’s brush depicts the fur and lace trim, together with the satin velvet of the gown, with a tactile sensitivity. The innumerable pearls that run around the headdress and clothing seem to scintillate with real light. With his consummate mastery in rendering jewels and silken fabrics, Lampi knew how to confer an aura of aristocratic elegance to the portrait, allowing the less refined depiction of the actual sitter to take second stage: in this way, he protected the need for resemblance without having to do without the principle of decorum.

Together, the works can be dated to a little after the turn of the century, both for stylistic considerations and on the basis of the comparison with the two large portraits of the sovereigns painted by Lampi between 1804 and 1806 for the Abbey of St. Lambrecht in Styria (see R. Pancheri, ibid., pp. 98-99, figg. 100-101). The subject was revisited by the painter’s son, Giovanni Battista Lampi junior, in his Portrait of the Duchess of Massa and Carrara Beatrice d’Este, signed on the reverse ‘Peint par le Chevalier de Lampi fils An 1817’, today in the Galleria d’Arte Moderna in Palazzo Pitti, Florence (see R. Pancheri, ibid., pp. 108-110, fig. 118).

It should also be mentioned that two portraits by Lampi junior, depicting Francis I and Maria Theresa of Naples and Sicily, dated 1806, were noted as being at the Franzensmuseum in Brno (see Führer durch die Gemälde-Galerie des Franzens-Museums, Brno 1899, p. 22, cat. 78-79; W. Weckbecker, Handbuch der Kunstpflege in Österreich, Vienna 1902, p. 606). The two paintings, today untraceable, both measured 124 x 93 cm and were bequeathed to the museum collections by Anton Enzmann von Ronow in 1857.