Nina Crazy for Love

Giacomo Fiamminghi (1815–1895) demonstrated from his youth an innate tendency toward the figurative arts. He began exhibiting in Verona in 1858, participating in the exhibition organized by the Society of Fine Arts. The different themes of his works show that Fiamminghi was an eclectic painter, not bound to precise figurative compositions but ready to try his hand, with equally worthy results, at genre paintings, still life, and portraits. "Nina Crazy for Love" is the only example known today of Giacomo Fiamminghi's social or love genre subject. The painting, inspired by the melodrama "The Crazy for Love Nina" (1789) by Di Paisello to a libretto by Giuseppe Carpani, testifies to the transition from history painting to social commentary that was taking place in Verona in the first half of the 19th century. The torment of the woman, plunged into mad melancholy and obsessed by continuous ranting, is emphasized by the elements that crowd the composition: the broken portrait of the beloved who perished during a duel, the overturned table, the letters abandoned on the floor, and the untidy bed.