Glorification of the podestà Vincenzo Dolfin

This work, which once hung with the lunettes by Francesco Maffei and Jacopo Bassano in the Council Chamber in the Palazzo del Podestà in Vicenza, dates back to 1647.

It is the first of the two large canvases (the second depicts the Glorification of the podestà Girolamo Bragadin, Inv. A 328) painted by Giulio Carpioni for the Palazzo del Podestà in Vicenza. With these paintings the artist competes directly with Maffei, though he is dealing with a theme that is not very congenial for him, very far from his more characteristic repertoire.

The scene, which is particularly crowded, portrays the podestà Vincenzo Dolfin who convinces two elegant female figures, representing Peace and the City, to shake hands as a sign of making peace. The reconciliation of the two women takes place before an old man wearing a crown, with a sceptre, a cardinal’s hat and the horned cap of the doge of Venice symbolising political and religious power, and in the presence of the personifications of Justice, holding the scales, of Eternity and of Discord, who is defeated and therefore lying on the ground. Fame, who soars into the sky next to Fortune (the bald figure on the right) spreading her broad wings, blows her trumpet to chase away vices and dominates a male figure with a star on his head, lying at her feet, who alludes to wicked Destiny.

“Here Maffei’s rapid brushwork is replaced by the prevalence of closely applied coats of colour in an incisive drawing, indubitably colder and without mystic tones” (Villa).