FNetti

The zither player

Oil on canvas, cm 52,3x26

Signed on the lower left «FNetti»

Bari, Pinacoteca Metropolitana “Corrado Giaquinto”

The zither player is a young man with a small figure, who descends the stairs in a setting not properly defined, immersed in the music he produces. The perspective from below allows the viewer to see the picture starting from the last step of the foreshorted staircase, on wich the citator has not yet laid his foot. The gaze thus, going up, can see a green and flowered garden. Painting’s origin is unclear, but surely is made as part the studies concerned the Ancient choir coming out the temple, so, in the early 1870s. Because of the rare element of the stair and the setting, we think about an autonomous subject, more than a real sketch, despite the shapes are skatched and there is some stylistic harshness. It’s usual, on the other hand, that Netti in these years uses a sketchy and material brushwork, giving more space to the power of colour, able to create shapes without the help of the lines.