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Artist

Luca Giordano

Year
Naples 1634 - 1705
Price range
250,000 – 3,000,000 USD
Luca Giordano, a prolific painter and draughtsman, worked in Italy and Spain and is widely regarded as the father of high Neapolitan Baroque art.

Giordano possessed extraordinary talents, having the protean ability to freely appropriate the styles of other masters and to do so at exceptional speeds, prompting the moniker ‘Luca Fa Presto’ (‘Luca paints quickly’). He approached all subjects, whether religious or profane in both oil or fresco with the same ease and inventiveness, leaving behind an exceptionally large œuvre that stands as a testament to his virtuosity. Giordano said of himself that he had a gold, a silver and bronze brush, an admission that his works range from the brilliant to the mediocre depending on the attention he gave to them. Giordano’s personal style defined the work of the next generation of Neapolitan painters, especially that of Francesco Solimena (1657–1747).

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Selected artworks
Market

Top 3 auction prices

657,421 $
2000
937,000 $
2008
1,648,398 $
2014

Details

The sales are: Bukowskis Stockholm – 5 December 2000 lot 398 (6,400,000 SEK; catalogued as ‘attributed to Luca Giordano’), Sotheby’s New York – 24 January 2008 lot 103, and Christie’s London – 8 July 2014 lot 38 (962,500 GBP).
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Notable exhibitions

Paris, Petit PalaisLuca Giordano (1634-1705): The Triumph of the Neapolitan Painting, 14 November 2019 – 23 February 2020; travelled to Naples, Museo e Real Bosco di Capodimonte, Luca Giordano: From Nature to Painting, 8 October 2020 – 11 April 2021. Curated by Stefano Causa and Patrizia Piscitello.

Naples, Museo e Real Bosco di CapodimonteLuca Giordano, 3 March – 5 June 2001; Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, 22 June – 7 October 2001; Los Angeles, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 4 November 2001 – 20 Janruary 2002. Curated by Patrizia Piscitello and Alessandra Rullo.

London, Royal Academy of Arts, Luca Giordano, 30 September – 15 December 1982; travelled to Washington D.C., National Gallery of Art, Feb – April 1983; Paris, Grand Palais, June – August 1983; Turin, Fondazione Agnelli, October – December 1983. Curated by Gina C. Ascione.

 

Books on Luca Giordano

Stefano Causa, ed., Luca Giordano, le triomphe de la peinture, exh. cat. Paris, 2019.

Andrés Úbeda de los Cobos, Luca Giordano at the Museo Nacional del Prado: Catalogue Raisonné, Madrid, 2017.

Oreste Ferrari and Giuseppe Scavizzi, Luca Giordano: L’opera completa, 2 vols. 2nd edn. Naples, 2000.

Oreste Ferrari and Giuseppe Scavizzi, Luca Giordano, 3 vols. rev. edn. Naples, 1992.

Mary G. Neill, A Taste for Angels: Neapolitan Painting in North America 1650-1750, exh. cat. New Haven, 1987.

Bernardo de Dominici, Vita del Cavaliere D. Luca Giordano, Pittore Napoletano, Naples, 1729.

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