GIOVANNI BATTISTA RUOPPOLO
(Naples, 1629 - 1693)

and LUCA GIORDANO
(Naples, 1634 - 1705)

Fruit, Flowers, a Ceramic Dish and a Vase on a Stone Ledge
Beneath a Grape Arbor, with Two Women Gathering the Bounty

Oil on canvas
46 ¼ x 66 ⅝ inches (117.5 x 169.2 cm)

Provenance:

Robert Evans (1930–2019), Woodland, Beverly Hills, California.

The early seventeenth century witnessed a new flowering of still-life painting across Europe. While the genre was deeply rooted in the tradition of Northern painting, independent still life painting in Italy first took hold in the first years of the 1600s particularly through the revolutionary works of Caravaggio. Caravaggio famously asserted that it was equally difficult to paint a still-life as it was to paint figures, and still-life quickly became the province of serious artistic scrutiny in Italy. Caravaggio’s influence was felt throughout the peninsula but most appreciably in Rome and Naples where he spent the key periods of his career. The present painting is a spectacular, newly discovered work by Giovanni Battista Ruoppolo, one of the principal still-life painters of seventeenth-century Naples, and a specialist in fruits, flowers, ceramics, and other vessels. Ruoppolo was an ambitious painter, often working on a monumental scale and in collaboration with some of the leading Neapolitan artistic personalities of his day, including Luca Giordano, who painted the figures in the present work. Ruoppolo’s characteristic style reveals an awareness of Caravaggio, the influence of his predecessors in Naples, and the impact of the Antwerp painter Abraham Breughel’s arrival in Naples in the 1670s.  

Our painting presents an impressive display of fruits arrayed on a stone ledge: figs, cherries, pears, peaches, plums and other stone fruits. These are interspersed with flowers—morning glories, bellflowers, narcissuses—all set before an arbor covered with hanging vines producing three varieties of grapes. An upturned blue-and-white majolica bowl centers the composition, with a figured terracotta flowerpot next to it and a wooded landscape in the distance. Ruoppolo’s sensitivity to ceramics—which frequently appear in his compositions and are treated with great realism—is undoubtedly related to the fact that his father Francesco and brother Carlo (as well as his father-in-law Bernardo Congiusto) were majolica makers.i Intriguingly, a large sketch of a vase appeared on the reverse of the original canvas during its recent relining (Fig. 1).  

The two young women—posed as if in conversation as they are about to gather some of the bounty—and the diminutive, almost sketched figure carrying a basket in the upper right are by Luca Giordano, Naples’ most prominent painter of the Seicento. Such a collaboration between still-life specialists and figure painters was common in Naples. The eighteenth-century Neapolitan painter and writer Bernardo de’ Dominici—who devoted a long biography to Ruoppolo, whom he considered the great master of Neapolitan still life—recorded that Luca Giordano organized an exhibition of 14 large-scale paintings in which Ruoppolo participated. The exhibition was dedicated to the Viceroy of Naples, the Marchese del Carpio, and the series of paintings celebrated the riches of the earth, the air, and the sea. In these grand still-lifes, Giordano painted the figures, working in collaboration with Giuseppe Recco, Abraham Brueghel, Francesco della Questa, and Ruoppolo. While the exact date of the exhibition is not known, it is thought to have taken place between 1680 and 1687.ii   

Our painting dates from this same moment in the mature period of Ruoppolo’s career. Other collaborations between Ruoppolo and Giordano include one recently on the art market in Rome (Fig. 2),iii and two other canvases representing Autumn and Summer (formerly in the collection of the Marchese del Carpio) in a Dutch private collection.iv Additionally, a painting by Ruoppolo with figures by Giacomo del Pò is in an Italian private collection.v 

We are grateful to Dr. Nicola Spinosa, who was confirmed Giovanni Battista Ruoppolo’s authorship of this painting in collaboration with Luca Giordano (written communication, 27 March 2022).vi Spinosa suggests a date of just after 1680 for the painting, at the moment when Ruoppolo was producing his highest-quality works. 

[i] Denise Maria Pagano, Ritorno al Barocco: da Caravaggio a Vanvitelli, ed. Nicola Spinosa, Naples, 2009, p. 412.

[ii] Luigi Salerno, La natura morta italiana, 1560–1805, Rome, 1984, pp. 198-201.

[iii] Denise Maria Pagano, Ritorno al Barocco, cat. no. 1.243, p. 415.

[iv] Riccardo Lattuada, Capolavori in Festa: Effimero Barocco a Largo di Palazzo (1683–1759), Naples, 1997, pp. 165-169; Achille Della Ragione, La Natura Morta Napoletana Dei Recco e Dei Ruoppolo, Naples, 2009, pp. 24, fig. 104.

[v] Della Ragione, La Natura Morta Napoletana, pp. 24, fig. 105.

[vi] A catalogue entry on this painting by Dr. Spinosa is available upon request.