Giovanni Boldini was an Italian genre and portrait painter who lived and worked in Paris for most of his career. Boldini was born in Ferrara. He was the son of a painter of religious subjects, and the younger brother of architect Luigi (Louis) Boldini. In 1862, he went to Florence for six years to study and pursue painting. He only infrequently attended classes at the Academy of Fine Arts, but in Florence, met other realist painters known as the Macchiaioli, who were Italian precursors to Impressionism. Their influence is seen in Boldini’s landscapes which show his spontaneous response to nature, although it is for his portraits that he became best known.
From 1872 he lived in Paris, where he became a friend of Edgar Degas. He also had a romantic relationship with a French woman named Berthe, who would a regular model for him in the same decade. He became the most fashionable portrait painter in Paris in the late 19th century, with a dashing style of painting. It is known that he visited Amsterdam in July 1880 (see Kraan, Dromen van Holland, Zwolle 2002, p. 293) when he went to the Rijksmuseum then located in the Trippenhuis, just around the corner from where he painted this vivid cityscape. The situation on the Raamgracht was changing at that moment, since the bridge which is seen in the front was demolished in 1882 when the Houtgracht changed into Waterlooplein. The bridge, originally a drawbridge as can be seen on a photo from 1864, had already changed when Boldini made this sketch. Boldini made this vivid sketch probably as a souvenir for himself.
Raamgracht 25-69 gezien vanaf Zwanenburgwal met rechts de ingang van de Moddermolensteeg en op de achtergrond de toren van de Zuiderkerk met de in 1878 geïnstalleerde nieuwe wijzers
(Stadsarchief Amsterdam foto Andreas Theodorus Rooswinkel 1838-1909)
Houtgracht, het latere Waterlooplein gezien naar Raamgracht, met op de achtergrond de toren van de Zuiderkerk en links de Zwanenburgwal situation ca 1867
Stadsarchief Amsterdam Pieter Oosterhuis (1816-1885)
Share this: