Fabio Fabbi

Sale: Christie's, New York, October 30, 2002, lot 86, illustrated
Acquired at the above sale by the present owner

The following condition report was kindly provided by Simon Parkes Art Conservation, Inc.: This painting is in good condition. The canvas is unlined. The paint layer is clean and lightly varnished. There is a patch on the reverse of the canvas in the center of the left side which does not appear to correspond to any visible paint loss. In the upper cloak of the old man walking with cane there seems to be a small loss and restoration. The remainder of the picture is in very good condition. Although faint stretcher marks are visible across the top edge, the canvas should not be lined and the picture should be hung as is.
"This lot is offered for sale subject to Sotheby's Conditions of Business, which are available on request and printed in Sotheby's sale catalogues. The independent reports contained in this document are provided for prospective bidders' information only and without warranty by Sotheby's or the Seller."

One of the most prolific and successful Italian Orientalist painters of the nineteenth century, Fabio Fabbi first traveled to Egypt in the 1880s.  The animated brushwork and bright palette of the watercolors, pastels, and oils that this trip inspired earned him multiple awards and honors, including a professorship at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence.  Among Fabbi's most popular works were images of dancing girls and harem life, in which first-hand observation was often traded for personal fantasy.  The present work, however, featuring an Egyptian wedding procession in all its celebratory glory, demonstrates another side of Fabbi: though the artist has taken certain liberties with the costume of the bride and the silhouette of the minaret behind her, he records this important cultural practice with a surprising amount of realistic detail.  Indeed, the care with which Fabbi represents his subject can be gauged by one noted scholar's description of the "Zeffet el-'Arooseh," or procession of the bride, written a few decades before: "The bride and her party, after breakfasting together, generally set out a little after midday [toward the groom's house] . . . they follow a circuitous route, through several principal streets, for the sake of display," (Edward William Lane, An Account of the Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians, London, 1860 edition, p. 167).  The bride, the text goes on, may walk under a rose-colored canopy, open to the front, which is carried on poles by four men, a party of musicians leading their way (Lane, p. 165, ff.)  The various headgear of Fabbi's performers, and the individualized faces of two elderly passers-by, further demonstrate the artist's attentiveness to detail and are what separate this engaging work from others' more distanced representations of the scene.

This catalogue note was written by Dr. Emily M. Weeks.