Description
Clemente Spera (Novara 1661 – Milan 1742) – Adoration of the Shepherds in a landscape with ruins.
Oil on canvas, in a wooden frame.
Trained in Milan in the workshop of Giovanni Ghisolfi, Clemente Spera was among the leading specialists of the architectural capriccio with classical ruins, a genre in which he was frequently called to collaborate with prominent figure painters, notably Alessandro Magnasco.
The present canvas fully reflects this repertoire: a great ruined arch, flanked by remains of classical columns, forms a scenographic backdrop to a crowded Adoration of the Shepherds. On the left a group of figures with shepherds and a woman carrying a basket of fruit on her head approach among the ruins, while on the right the Holy Family, surrounded by onlookers and by animals, receives the Child laid in the crib, in a play of light and shadow typical of Lombard ruins painting.
Condition report: Lined canvas. Good state of conservation of the pictorial surface, with traces of old restoration and wear.
