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Drawing, Ceiling Design Depicting Iris and the Rainbow
This is a Drawing. It was created by Felice Giani. It is dated 1810–25 and we acquired it in 1901. Its medium is pen and brown ink, brush and watercolor on off-white laid paper. It is a part of the Drawings, Prints, and Graphic Design department.
Iris and the Rainbow
From high up in the heavens, the Greek goddess Iris strides forward, extending her arms in both directions. The drapery of her garments, caught by a forceful wind, clings to her legs and billows behind her. Although she seems embattled by the wind, with her head titled back and her body contorted, she remains a graceful figure in the midst of a chaotic scene. Three winged putti surround her, two fending off the storm clouds with guests of divine breath, the third flying triumphantly upward. Iris’s attention, however, is not on the storm or the putti. Instead, she gazes upward toward the delicately-rendered rainbow, which emerges from the clouds to signal a calm end to the violent storm below.
This ink and watercolor drawing is one of hundreds of works on paper by the Italian neoclassical artist Felice Giani in Cooper-Hewitt's collection—the largest holding of the artist’s work outside of Italy. Giani was a prolific painter and draftsman, best known for his numerous decorative schemes for walls and ceilings in the palaces, villas, and grand public buildings of Italy and France, including the Palazzo Milzetti in Faenza and the Palazzo Quirinale in Rome. A large portion of Giani’s drawings are figure studies for his paintings and interior decorations. This drawing of Iris and the rainbow, perhaps intended as a roundel for a vaulted ceiling, appears to be a preparatory sketch for a larger cycle of paintings
Giani, like many of his contemporaries, drew on ancient Greek and Roman literature, history, and mythology for his decorative programs. His choice of subjects often reflected the concerns of his patrons. His mythological subjects might have taken on allegorical meanings in the unstable period of Napoleon’s dramatic conquests and the short-lived Italian republic around the turn of the 19th century. Giani’s Iris may have been meant to suggest a greater calm in the midst of a politically turbulent time.
This object was featured in our Object of the Week series in a post titled Iris and the Rainbow.
It is credited Museum purchase through gift of various donors.
- Mural, Dutch Clouds
- digital print on cellulose, latex, nylon substrate.
- Gift of Maharam.
- 2012-11-2-1/5
- Drawing, Rainbow over a Hilly Landscape
- oil on canvas.
- Gift of Louis P. Church.
- 1917-4-1323
- Poster, The Rainbow to Europe
- offset lithograph on paper.
- Gift of Mrs. E. McKnight Kauffer.
- 1963-39-124-b
Our curators have highlighted 3 objects that are related to this one.
- Print, Okazaki, Tenshin Bridge, in The Fifty-Three Stations of the Tokaido...
- woodblock print (ukiyo-e) on mulberry paper (washi), ink with color .
- Gift of Mary Rutherford Jay.
- 1948-134-39
- Sidewall (USA)
- machine-printed paper.
- Gift of Philadelphia Museum of Art.
- 1971-58-8-a,b
- Frieze, Serpentine
- hand-folded and dyed japanese paper.
- Gift of Barbara White.
- 2000-64-43
Its dimensions are
33.5 x 30.8 cm (13 3/16 x 12 1/8 in.) Mat: 32.5 x 29.8 cm (12 13/16 x 11 3/4 in.) Frame H x W x D: 39.7 x 50.2 x 2.5 cm (15 5/8 in. x 19 3/4 in. x 1 in.)
It is inscribed
Inscribed in pen and brown ink, lower margin, center: Iride Arcobaleno.
Cite this object as
Drawing, Ceiling Design Depicting Iris and the Rainbow; Felice Giani (Italian, 1758–1823); Italy; pen and brown ink, brush and watercolor on off-white laid paper; 33.5 x 30.8 cm (13 3/16 x 12 1/8 in.) Mat: 32.5 x 29.8 cm (12 13/16 x 11 3/4 in.) Frame H x W x D: 39.7 x 50.2 x 2.5 cm (15 5/8 in. x 19 3/4 in. x 1 in.); Museum purchase through gift of various donors; 1901-39-1807
This object was previously on display as a part of the exhibition Hewitt Sisters Collect.
