Corrado Cagli - Untitled - FCEC001

The iconographic subject of Christ's face has ancient origins and is connected to the legend of Veronica. The episode in which Christ's true likeness was imprinted on a cloth used by a woman to wipe his face is also recounted in the Gospels. This woman was identified as Veronica, likely due to the similarity with the Latin words "Vera Icon." Since the early Christian era, the face of Christ has been the object of particular veneration. Its depiction has pervaded the entire history of Western art. From the first iconic representations of the early Christian and early Middle Ages, we gradually moved on to increasingly naturalistic (beginning with the Renaissance) or realistic (typical of Flemish art) depictions.

In this work, Corrado Cagli draws inspiration from Renaissance art not only for the thematic choice but also for the interpretative approach. In addition to seeking a perfectly naturalistic rendering of the subject, the artist creates a perfectly proportioned and calibrated composition. The expansive volumes and monumentality of this fully frontal Christ, as well as the plastic connotation the artist achieves through engraving, reveal a revisitation of sixteenth-century painting. The strokes are brief and lively in delineating the folds of the robe, while they are more linear in describing the facial features. The interpretation is certainly concise, but Cagli's skill lies precisely in capturing, with just a few graphic strokes, the physiognomic details and the meaning of this representation. This characteristic is expressed through a refined and fascinating antique patina.

Corrado Cagli was born in Ancona in 1910 and died in Rome in 1976. His artistic training was divided between Rome, Paris, and New York. Throughout his career, he experimented with various artistic languages, ultimately arriving at a modern contextualization of 15th- and 16th-century art. His works are always characterized by geometric and abstract motifs, earning him the nickname "the Italian Picasso." He employed a variety of techniques, including unusual ones, such as encaustic and mosaic.

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