Giovanni Paolo Panini

Giovanni Paolo Panini was an expert at combining various architectural motifs producing elegant and convincing views that blended daily life with the monuments of the past. This was a time honoured artistic device, employed by everyone from medieval manuscript illuminators to 17th century Dutch landscape painters, but the demand for such capricci filled with images of important antique relics reached its height during the 18th century, as Grand Tourists sought to acquire paintings that captured the essence of the scenes and monuments that they had seen on their travels.

Here, in this fine capriccio, the Temple of Vesta dominates the background of Panini's composition, acting like a backdrop on a stage design for the many figures which populate the foreground. Much like a play, his figures take up their daily roles amidst the grandeur of The Eternal City. In the left foreground a man is resting with his dog, to the right, a mother, holding her child, is watching a group of young men conversing and in the middle distance, a man on his horse traverses in front of the Temple of Vesta.