Pompeo Batoni (1708-1787) was the most celebrated painter in Rome in his day. For nearly half a century he recorded the international travellers who visited the city on the Grand Tour, and
these portraits remain among the most memorable artistic accomplishments of the period. His allegorical, religious, and mythological paintings were also highly prized by royal and aristocratic
patrons and collectors in Britain and on the Continent.
This book, published in celebration of the tercentenary of Batoni's birth, offers a vivid appreciation of his work. More than 150 full-colour illustrations represent the finest examples of his
paintings from public and private collections in Europe and the United States. Some of these works are newly discovered, and others have never before been on public display. The illuminating
text by Edgar Peters Bowron and Peter Bjorn Kerber explores the textual and visual sources for Baroni's history paintings, often undeservedly neglected in favour of his portraits; the origins
and prototypes of his portrait style; the extraordinary patronage Batoni enjoyed as perhaps the only eighteenth-century painter to work for virtually all of the major European courts; his
working methods and techniques; and his critical reception.
