Stefano Torelli
Stefano Torelli (* 1712 in Bologna, † 1784 in Saint Petersburg ) was a native of the Italian artist family Torelli art painter active in Germany and especially in Russia.
Life
He received his training from his father, Felice Torelli, his mother Lucia Casalini and also painting with Francesco Solimena in Naples. In 1740 he was brought from Wilhelmine of Bayreuth for the redevelopment of the Old Palace at the Hermitage to Bayreuth. Here he created an allegorical ceiling painting Chilonis and Kleombrotros for the audience room. A little later he moved on to Saxony, where other works for King Augustus III. Quote of Poland and Saxony in the Catholic Hofkirche ( altarpiece Sermon of Saint Benno Benno in the chapel in 1752 and painting of the Blessed Sacrament Chapel 1755) and in Nischwitz castle. He also painted rooms from the Dresden Zwinger.
Through the Seven Years' War Torelli lost his job opportunities in Saxony. He went north, where he decorated the audience hall with ten allegorical paintings in the Lübeck Town Hall in 1761. Also in Lübeck, he married his daughter Camilla with the garrison commander, Count of Chasot.
After the Prussian-Russian separate peace Torelli went to Russia in 1762, where he was in St. Petersburg professor at the Art Academy and preferred court painter to the Empress Catherine II. He was particularly known for his numerous portraits of personalities of the Russian nobility.
Works (selection)
- Anna Alexeyevna Tschernyschewa, Hermitage, St. Petersburg
- Czarina Catherine II, Russian Museum, St. Petersburg
- Coronation of Catherine II, Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow
- Portrait of Count Chasot, St. Annen Museum, Lübeck
- Portraits of Count Heinrich Carl von Schimmelmann and Caroline Tugendreich Countess of mold man, born Friedeborn (approx. 1762), Reventlow Museum, Pederstrup Horslunde on Lolland, Denmark
- Portrait of businessman Jerome Kiisel, builder of the castle Bellevue in Lübeck, and his wife, St. Annen Museum, Lübeck