Francesco Robba
Francesco Robba (1 May 1698 – 24 January 1757) was an Italian sculptor of the Baroque period. Even while he is regarded as the leading Baroque sculptor of marble statues in the south-east Central Europe,[citation needed] he has remained practically unknown to the international scholarly public.[citation needed]
[edit] Life
Francesco Robba was born in Venice. He received his training in the workshop of the Venetian sculptor Pietro Baratta from 1711 to 1716. In 1720, he moved to Ljubljana to work with the Slovene master Luka Mislej and married his daughter Theresa in 1722.
In this early period, his first marble statues and reliefs still reflect the influence of Pietro Baratta. When Mislej died in 1727, Robba took over his workshop and his clientele. Soon Robba started to earn his own reputation and was awarded prestigious commissions by ecclesiastical, aristocratic and bourgeois patrons. Already in 1729 his work was praised in a letter to Prince Emmerich Esterházy, Archbishop of Esztergom by the rector of the Jesuit College in Zagreb, Francesco Saverio Barci.
From 1727 on his works attest of a growing self-confidence. His technical virtuosity manifests itself in the emotional expressions and the refined forms of his statues.
He was recognized by the people of Ljubljana as a "honorary citizen of Ljubljana". In 1743, he was elected to the External Council of the city. In 1745, he was appointed "state engineer" of Carniola. During all this time, he didn't loose contacts with Venice, since he paid several visits to his native city. This allowed him to remain familiar with the Baroque sculpture of central Italy and Rome.
In 1755 he left Ljubljana for Zagreb, Croatia, where he died on 24 January 1757.
[edit] Works
The best-known work by Francesco Robba is the Fountain of the Three Rivers of Carniola (1751), representing Ljubljanica, Sava and Krka. It has been inspired by the Bernini's Fountain of the Four Rivers on Piazza Navona during Robba's visit to Rome.
Other works include the Narcissus fountain (Ljubljana), the altar and the statues (1736) in St. James's Church (Ljubljana), an altar in the cathedral of Saint Nicholas (Ljubljana), an altar in the Franciscan Church of the Annunciation (Ljubljana), a statue of St. John Nepomuk in Klagenfurt (Austria) and an altar in the parish church in Vransko.[1]
The work of Francesco Robba was highlighted in an international scientific symposium, held in Ljubljana in November 1998.
[edit] References
- ^ Slovenian Ministry of Culture register of national heritage reference number ešd 3502
- Francesco Robba and the Venetian Baroque Sculpture of the Eighteenth Century; Rokus Publishing House Ltd., Ljubljana, Slovenia; ISBN 961-209-160-9
- Monica De Vincenti (1999). "Francesco Robba e la scultura barocca veneziana a Lubiana". Venezia Arti 13: 103.
