Il Festino

Il Festino is a beautiful etching and hand-colored gouache, finely engraved on copper and printed on laid paper. The work, which presents a remarkable quality of strokes and brilliant colors, is unsigned, but it is part of the 20 plates engraved in 1820 by the Swedish artist Carl Gustaf Hjalmar Mörner (or umo?rner) during his stay in Rome, certainly influenced by the style and manner of the coeval folkloric prints made by Bartolomeo Pinelli (cfr. Hermanin F., Una collezione di stampe e disegni dell’antico carnevale romano , Bollettino d’Arte, Rome, year I, January 1907, p. 28, cit.).

The title is engraved on plate on the lower center, and the print is numbered 19 on the lower right. The quality and the conditions of preservation of the print are excellent.

The work represents a celebration during the famous Roman Carnival , with numerous people, dressed-up or in costumes, dancing and walking below a stage on which a small orchestra is playing instruments.

The print, apart from being a work of quality, engraved with a masterful draftsmanship and bright colors, is also a folkloric and fun image expressing the carefreeness of life in Rome during the famous Carnival.