Gaetano Chierici

(Italian, 1838-1920)

A desperate venture

Footnotes

Provenance
Private collection, UK.

Exhibited
London, Royal Academy, 1880, no. 349.

Literature
H. Blackburn, Academy Notes, 1880.

Engraved
A. Bellenger, wood engraving, circa 1880.

The first picture to be noticed particularly on this wall is by a foreign artist — no. 349, Desperate Venture, G. Chierici;
remarkable for character and good painting. (H. Blackburn, Academy Notes, 1880)

Gaetano Chierici trained at The Reggio Emilia School of Fine Arts in 1850 and then moved to Florence in 1858 and enrolled at Academy's scuola del nudo. He had a natural flare for depicting the human form and this, combined with his narrative skill, often depicting an interior scene with several generations of a family, led to a celebrated career as one of Italy's finest genre painters. First Steps is typical of his work; it is grand in scale, but loses none of the quality that defines his work and for which he is celebrated. The scene is set in a cottage as a toddler sets off across the room towards the outstretched arms of her father while the rest of the family look on. The artist would have been familiar with such a setting having had an impoverished childhood. The work displays exquisite detail in the depiction of the objects in and around the room and illustrates clearly why Chierici enjoyed an international reputation exhibiting widely not only in his native Italy, but in the United States and London.