Rosalba Carriera, an originator of the Rococo…
1730 CE
Rosalba Carriera, an originator of the Rococo style in France and Italy, is a portrait painter and miniaturist best known for her work in pastels.
Some scholars suggest that Carriera had learned lacemaking from her mother and that, as the lace industry declined in Venice, she instead began decorating snuffboxes for the tourist trade.
Whatever the origins of her interest, Carriera first became known for her miniature portraits on snuffboxes.
She is the first artist to use ivory rather than vellum as a ground for miniatures.
By the time Carriera reached the age of twenty-five in 1700, her miniatures had won her special membership in the Academy of St. Luke in Rome.
Her art suits the refined and, to modern eyes, affected taste of her times.
Many notables passing through Venice have had her do their portraits.
The collector and financier Pierre Crozat had encouraged her to go to Paris.
She did so in March 1720, accompanied by her family, and became the idol of the French capital; she received commissions for thirty-six portraits, among them one of Louis XV as a child.
She became a member of the French Royal Academy in 1720 and the next year returned to Venice and her home on the Grand Canal, visited Modena, Parma, and Vienna, and had been received with much enthusiasm by rulers and courts.
She once more leaves Venice In 1730, this time to work for six months in Vienna, where Emperor Charles VI becomes her patron and the empress becomes her pupil.
Images
Rosalba Carriera: Flora, 1730; pastel on paper, Uffizi Gallery, Florence
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Regions
Southwest Europe
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