Giuseppe Cherubini (Ancona 1867 – Venice 1960)
Painting on canvas with scenes from the Venice carnival

Epoch: twentieth century

Oil and gold on canvas, 129 x 248 cm.

This work shows monumental figures in the foreground, behind which is the vedutistic view that immortalizes St. Mark’s Square with the Procuratie Vecchie. Looking closely at the figures, it emerges how they are not mere extras, but how there is a second reading of them related to the symbolism that connotes them. In this painting, we observe Colombina and Pierrot i.e. the beautiful and the eternally unlucky lover. On the opposite side a puppeteer and sarcastic figures mocking poor Pierrot. It could be interpreted as two allegorical scenes, one dedicated to love and its pains and the other, with allusions, conscious or not, to Pirandello’s literature and his famous line “You will learn to your cost that on the long journey of life you will meet many masks and few faces.”