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the Collection · the "Quadreria"
he greater part of the paintings housed in the Halls of Palazzo Pallavicini Rospigliosi since 1704 was put together by Cardinal Lazzaro Pallavicini (1602-1680).
The Pallavicini Gallery mainly includes paintings of the Roman and Emilian schools but also foreign works painted between the 15th and 18th centuries.
Part of the collection still adorns the rooms of the Casino. Among the most important paintings are works by Guido Reni and Luca Giordano.
You can admire Reni's "Christ Crucified".
Christ Crucified stands out for its splendid pictorial quality, the lightness of the brush strokes and the range of colours. The painting seems to be an excellent example of Reni's mature period, probably datable to around 1638-1640 and differs in many ways from other Crucified Christs done by the painter.
In "Andromeda freed by Perseus" the collaboration between Guido Reni and Elisabetta Sirani (1638-1665) mentioned in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Inventories must definitely be ruled out, for obvious chronological reasons and because of the high quality of the work, which bears no relation to the usual standard of the Bolognese painter.
The dating of around 1623, suggested by Kurz, does not seem acceptable and perhaps should be moved to around 1635 or a little earlier.
Paintings by Luca Giordano that can be seen are "The Death of Julian the Apostate" and "The conversion of Saul".
The latter canvas is signed "Jordanus F.". These are two splendid, highly personal, meditations on Venetian themes and, above all, on Pietro da Cortona; of these, the great fresco in the Throne Rome in Palazzo Barberini is particularly reminiscent of the first of the two canvases.
Both compositions are repeated, with some variations, in two magnificent canvases, undoubtedly by the same artist, owned by the Casita del Principe in the Escorial near Madrid and which might belong to a later period of Giordano's work.
There is a well-known model of the "Conversion of Saul", deposited by the Louvre Museum in the Museum of Périgod in Périgueux (signed "Jordanus F.") and coming from the Lacaze Collection. The most probable date would be around 1680, or a little earlier.
They came to the Pallavicini Gallery in 1693 in payment of the bankruptcy settlement of a certain Simone Giogalli.
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