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Old oil painting on canvas depicting the "Portrait of Cardinal Giovan Carlo de Medici". Small lack of color on the canvas, and old restorations present. Period: 17th century Provenance: Italy Antique frame Replaced frame, and reintel. Dimensions: canvas 48x63.5cm - frame 58x73cm Cardinal Giovan Carlo has played the card of cheerfulness. He was the center of elegant life and little concerned with serious matters. Son of Cosimo II, he was brought up in the splendor of the court alongside his four brothers, including the future Grand Duke Ferdinand II. He was a gallant suitor of women, historical news and iconography portray him in good physical health. He had brio, wit and a pronounced aesthetic taste which led him to take an interest in art and artists, and it is to him that we owe the birth of art collections today. 'hui preserved in the Uffizi and the Galleria Palatina. Giovan Carlo, who was also responsible for the finances of the State, bought in 1657 an old tiratoio dell'Arte della Lana, known as Pergola, on which he had a new theater built by the architect Ferdinando Tacca, of which the plan was completely different from the classic semicircle: the "Teatro all'Italiana". Equipped with numerous acoustic "toilets" and a large stage with a canopy at the rear to better hear the "recitar cantando", it marked the beginning of modern theater for melodrama and was taken as an example, becoming the model of base from which all theaters in Europe were subsequently built. He devoted himself above all to the pleasures of the world, from games to jokes, and even on the eve of his death, it is said that, in the cardinal's room, the usual brigade of friends happily played cards.
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