Mattia Jona, Master Drawings and Prints, Japanese Prints - Piazzetta Guastalla 5, 20122 Milan, Italy, tel (+39) 02 8053315

LUIGI SABATELLI (Florence 1772 - Milan 1850) 'ET VIDI, ET ECCE NUBEM CANDIDAM....' (St. John's Apocalypse, Chapter XIV)
Etching. From the series of six prints for St. John's Apocalypse conceived by Sabatelli in a pre-romantic and visionary style and published in Milan in 1809/10. See Gabinetto Disegni e Stampe degli Uffizi, Florence, 'Luigi Sabatelli: Disegni e Incisioni', exhibition catalogue by Carlo Del Bravo and Beatrice Paolozzi Strozzi, Florence 1978; no. 63, fig. 66. A very good impression on thick wove paper, with full margins; slightly foxed, otherwise in very good condition. To the platemark 657 x 455 mm, the entire sheet measuring 920 x 647 mm.

Sabatelli was the most talented of the Tuscan painters of the generation after Pietro Benvenuti. He was born in the house of Marchese Pier Roberto Capponi, in Florence, while his own father was in domestic service there. The Marchese Capponi was Sabatelli's early sponsor, financing his education at the Florentine Academy and his sojourns in Rome and Venice. In 1808 Luigi Sabatelli was appointed to the chair of painting at the Brera Academy in Milan. There he remained over forty years, although he continued to carry out commissions in Tuscany. During his mature years, Sabatelli established himself as a decorator and fresco painter, with numerous public and private commissions. Sabatelli was a fine painter and one of the premier pre-romantic draftsmen of nineteenth century Italy. He was also an accomplished etcher.