Provenance
Sale Vercelli, Italy, Casa d’Aste, Meeting Art, A. p. A., November 7, 2015, no. 383.
In his still definitive article on the eighteenth-century Roman, Neo-Classical painter Vincenzo
Camuccini, Ulrich Hiesinger wrote, “Camuccini’s talents as a painter and his official positions in
the papal government made him, after Canova, the most sought after and influential artist in Rome
during the early decades of the nineteenth century…Contemporaries considered him one of the
few living artists worthy of comparison with the great figures of Italy’s artistic past.” 1 Born in
Rome, Camuccini was trained by his older brother, Pietro, a part-time painter, as well as restorer
and dealer, and the painter Domenico Corvi, but it was through observation and study of the
Renaissance masters in the Vatican, especially Raphael and Michelangelo, that the artist perfected
his superb drawing technique. Although he painted some religious subjects and portraits, the bulk
of Camuccini’s works were devoted to scenes of Greco-Roman history.
Elected to the Academy of St. Luke in 1802, Camuccini then became its head in 1805 through
suspension of the minimum age requirements. He served until 1810 and then was a professor of
painting until, on Canova’s death in 1822, he once again assumed the presidency until 1827. His
long association with the papacy began in 1803 when Pius VII appointed him Director of the
Vatican Mosaic Studios. Then in 1809, he was named Superintendent of the Vatican Picture
Galleries, and from 1814 until the year before his death he served in his most important capacity
as Inspector of Public Paintings for Rome and the Papal States.
Following Napoleon’s annexation of the Papal States in 1810, Camuccini travelled to Paris, and
received commissions (unfulfilled) from the Emperor and also met the leading French Neo-
Classical painters David, Gros, and Gerard. However, he soon returned to Rome and continued his
prolific career, fulfilling commissions from both Italian patrons and many foreigners visiting on
the Grand Tour. As Hiesinger noted “these contemporary visitors came eventually to regard
Camuccini himself as a local landmark, while for many Romans he became the very symbol of
continuing national pride in the arts.”2 Camuccini also formed a major collection of Old Master
paintings, including a notable Madonna by Raphael. In 1833 when excavations at the Pantheon
uncovered the tomb of Raphael, it was Camuccini who was asked to record the findings.
Camuccini first achieved fame with two great historical compositions produced over several years
– The Death of Julius Caesar and The Death of Verginia . They were commissioned by an English
patron in 1793 but only completed by 1818, by which time the original patron had died, and the
enormous works were acquired by Ferdinand I for his court in Naples. For these scenes of ancient
history, Camuccini already began his life-long practice of studying antique models and aided by
archaeologists perfected the details of costume and architecture. As Hiesinger noted, “Together the
Caesar and Verginia set a pattern for the meticulously executed expansive historical compositions
that were to become Camuccini’s stock-in-trade.” And he further observed that the success of
Camuccini’s works was due to its rejection of the older Baroque traditions in favor of a “deliberate
and painstaking formality, suggesting an aspiration to the absolute in their clarity and precision.”3
The austere modernism of this Neo-Classical approach, inspired in part by the writings of
Winkelmann and the examples of Mengs and Canova, is evident in the many evocations of Roman
history that Camuccini derived from the reading of ancient texts.
This relatively early work it is clearly a scene of triumph with the heroic victor in a grand helmet
standing in a chariot drawn by several rambunctious horses. A crowd by his side and behind him
carry in the trophies of his victory. The background setting of pyramidal structures suggests that
the scene is not set in Rome. Distinctive and providing a possible clue to the identity of the subject
are the two elephants in the background who are ridden by several nearly naked men. Elephants
had been part of triumphal processions since ancient times (fig. 1), but of course the most famous
ancient hero to make use of elephants was the Carthaginian Hannibal, and when sold in 2015, this
painting was in fact identified as The Triumph of Hannibal .4 But Hannibal was an African and the
victorious figure here is obviously a Roman and dressed in the manner Camucinni usually
employed for his Roman figures (fig. 2). The greatest of Roman leaders to be depicted in a
triumphal scene with elephants was Julius Caesar in the well-known series of paintings by Andrea
Mantegna at Hampton Court, which were widely circulated in woodcuts (fig. 3). They in turn
served to inspire A Roman Triumph also with elephants by Rubens (fig. 4). Another triumph with
elephants, however, was also staged by Caesar’s rival, Pompey. On his return to Rome in 61 B. C.,
following his victories in Sicily and Africa, Pompey demanded a triumphal entry, and seeking to
outdo his rivals had his chariot pulled by an elephant to represent his African conquests. His use of
the exotic beast, however, was not successful as this elephant was too large to fit through the city
gate. The triumph of Pompey with several elephants was depicted in an elaborate drawing by the
eighteenth-century French artist Gabriel de Saint-Aubin (fig. 5).5
Yet another Roman consul who had engaged in warfare with Hannibal and his elephants and made
a triumphal entry with the beasts was Marcus Claudius Marcellus (ca. 268 -208 B. C.). Two
drawings6 of a Roman triumph by Camuccini (figs. 6 and 7), quite similar to the present oil sketch,
have been identified as representing this heroic figure. In these works the composition moves from
left to right; the elephants and their riders are in the background, and the setting more clearly
seems to represent the classical structures of ancient Rome. When it was exhibited in 1978, the
version from the Camuccini family collection (fig. 7) was identified as the celebratory triumph of
Marcellus over the Gauls,7 but in fact it and our oil sketch more likely represent his later triumph
celebrating his defeat of the forces of Hannibal in the 2nd Punic War of 261 B. C. On this occasion,
according to the Roman historian Livy, “eight elephants were led in procession to signalize
Marcellus’ victory over the Carthaginians.”8 If this is indeed the subject then the number of
elephants was reduced by Camuccini for the sake of compositional clarity. Camuccini was a most
conscientious artist who produced many preliminary drawings and bozzetti to perfect his
compositions, their lighting and modeling, so it is indeed likely that having first designed a left to
right format in the two drawings, he then shifted in this brilliant oil sketch to a right to left format.
While the two careful preliminary drawings reveal what Anthony Clark characterized as
Camuccini’s “vigorous force of organization,”9 this oil sketch is remarkable for its immediacy,
spontaneity, and luminous brilliance. As Roberta Olson has observed, “Camuccini’s historical
canvases reflect a fine chromatic sensibility derived from the eighteenth century masters,”10 and
that is certainly true in this case, especially in the figure of the hero in his golden armor and pink
cape dramatically set against a cloud of smoke (fig. 8).