Skip to main content

Visit Main Menu Block

  • Hours & Admission
  • Accessibility & Amenities
  • Tours & Group Visits
  • Visitor Guidelines

Exhibitions and Events Main Menu Block

  • Exhibitions
  • Events

Art and Design Main Menu Block

  • The Collection
  • Projects & Publications
  • Past Exhibitions

Footer Main

  • Become a Member
  • Give
  • Who We Are
  • Opportunities
  • Rent the Museum

Image

Previous 1 2 3 / 3 Next

Silvestro Lega

The Dying Mazzini (Mazzini morente), 1873

Description

Maker

  • Silvestro Lega, 1826-1895, Italian

Title

The Dying Mazzini (Mazzini morente)

Year

1873

Medium

Oil on canvas

Materials/Techniques

Materials

  • oil paint

Supports

  • canvas

Dimensions

76.5 x 100.3 cm (30 1/8 x 39 1/2 inches)

Signature / Inscription / Marks

Signed and dated LR:S. Lega 73

Place

Italy

Type

  • Paintings

Credit

Helen M. Danforth Acquisition Fund

Object Number

59.071

About

In preparation for this somber portrait, Silvestro Lega made sketches of the head of the Italian patriot Giuseppe Mazzini (1805-1872) and of the bedroom in which he died. Relying on these drawings, Lega constructed an image of his subject in the last hours of life, rather than a death portrait. His painting depicts a peaceful and carefully groomed Mazzini, wrapped in a plaid shawl that covers his black suit. He had always dressed in black to symbolize mourning for Italian states that were separated by foreign rule and whose unification came about only after his death. The artist was a leading member of the Italian realist painters known as the Macchiaioli, a name that refers to their manner of applying paint as macchie (spots or patches). When Lega exhibited this portrait in Florence in 1873, critics commented on the contrast between its profound sadness and the great vitality for which Mazzini had been known.

Signed and dated LR:S. Lega 73

Italy
[]

Projects & Publications

Publications

James Duncan

An Enlightened Victorian

European Paintings and Sculpture, ca. 1770 - 1937

Exhibition History

Exhibition History

From the Reserve I

April 9 - August 3, 1994

European Painting and Sculpture, circa 1770-1937

October 18, 1991 - January 26, 1992

Italian Painting

April 6 - August 25, 1990

Use

The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use. This object is in the public domain (CC0 1.0). This object is The Dying Mazzini (Mazzini morente) with the accession number of 59.071. To request high-resolution files or new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.

Feedback

We view our online collection as a living documents, and our records are frequently revised and enhanced. If you have additional information or have spotted an error, please send feedback to curatorial@risd.edu.

RISD Museum

  •  Facebook
  •  Twitter
  •  Instagram
  •  Vimeo
  •  Pinterest
  •  SoundCloud

Footer Main

  • Become a Member
  • Give
  • Who We Are
  • Opportunities
  • Rent the Museum

Footer Secondary

  • Image Request
  • Press Office
  • Rent the Museum
  • Terms of Use