Brazil in Soft Greens — St. Fidelis Jesuit Mission View, Aquatint 1821
€ 340
Original antique · The actual sheet photographed · Certificate of authenticity on request · Sold unframed · Worldwide shipping from € 15 (rates)
Date
1821
Sheet size
24.2 × 34.4 cm (9.5 × 13.5 in)
Condition
Good
Reference
BG-01539
Condition
Very good condition for its age. Light overall toning and minor surface soiling consistent with early-19th-century works. No major defects observed. Please study the scan carefully.
About this sheet
The Jesuit mission of St. Fidelis on the Paraíba River in Brazil, a hand-colored aquatint engraving from Giulio Ferrario's Il Costume Antico e Moderno, l'America, in the Italian edition published in Milan in 1821. The sheet has no title line in the image, and the plate number is engraved at the upper right.
A broad river runs across the foreground, with a man paddling a dugout canoe at the right. Beyond it, a mission church with a small tiered cupola stands in a clearing on the rise, and a few low huts with red tile roofs sit scattered at either side. Wooded hills climb behind in overlapping tones of soft green, with a few palms standing along the ridge, and the sky is pale and clouded. The soft aquatint grain gives the greens and blues of the hills their gentle gradation.
Ferrario's work was a large illustrated survey of the dress, customs and buildings of the peoples of the world, issued in Milan from about 1815 to 1826, and its volume on the Americas drew on travel accounts for its views.
