The skeletons

Giovanni Battista Piranesi
Italy
1720 – 1778

The skeletons
from the series Grotteschi
1747-49; published 1750-early 1770s
etching, drypoint, burnishing on paper
Place made
Rome
Medium
etching, drypoint, burnishing on paper
Dimensions
39.5 x 54.5 cm (plate)
50.0 x 62.5 cm (sheet)
Credit line
V.B.F. Young Bequest Fund 2009
Accession number
20093G36
Signature and date
Signed, engraved in plate, l.r., "Piranesi F.". Not dated.
Catalogue raisonne
Focillon (1918) 30; Robinson (1986) 21 ii/v; Wilton-Ely (1994) 21
Media category
Print
Collection area
European prints

  • WALL LABEL: A Beautiful Line: Italian prints from Mantegna to Piranesi, 2012

     

    In the mid-1740s Piranesi embarked on a series of four prints entitled Grotteschi (Grotesques). He combined elements of architectural and natural decay in playful medleys, which reveal a debt to Tiepolo’s Capricci prints.

     

    In The Skeletons, Piranesi layers disparate elements to create a chaotic world where sculptures, skeletons and foliage fuse into one another. His composition includes a segment of a zodiac band in the upper right showing Sagittarius (November) and Scorpio (October) in reverse order. Atop a shell-like structure, an animated skeleton, its frame partially covered in flesh, wildly gesticulates, while another reclines in the foreground. 

     

    Maria Zagala, Associate Curator of Prints, Drawings & Photographs

  • A beautiful line. Italian prints from Mantegna to Piranesi

    Art Gallery of South Australia, 20 August 2010 – 31 October 2010
  • [Book] Robison, Andrew. Piranesi: Early Architectural Fantasies: a Catalogue Raisonne of the Etchings.
  • [Book] Wilton-Ely, J. Giovanni Battista Piranesi, the complete etchings.
  • [Book] Focillon, Henri. Giovanni-Battista Piranesi : Essai De Catalogue Raissonne De Son Oeuvre.
  • [Journal] AGSA Magazine.
  • [Book] Zagala, Maria. A Beautiful Line : Italian prints from Mantegna to Piranesi.
  • Giovanni Battista Piranesi 1720 – 1778

    The skeletons

    1747-49; published 1750-early 1770s
    etching, drypoint, burnishing on paper
    Accession no: 20093G36