The Festival at Piedigrotta

This work can be identified as the Piedigrotta shown in 1896 at the exhibition of the Naples Società Promotrice di Belle Arti and mentioned by the art historian Alfredo Schettini in his monograph on the painter in 1949. Dated 1895, it shows the revels at Piedigrotta, which were celebrated that very year with a particular abundance of events on the occasion of the second Naples Summer Festival. A group of common folk have just returned from the parade in costume, as suggested by the tambourine and the helmet of the woman in the centre, and the fires of other revellers gleam in the darkness of the night all around. A youth at the bottom of the picture has fallen into a drunken stupor after drinking too much wine and another can be seen in profile higher up like a sort of modern satyr in these Neapolitan bacchanals. The sky in the background is lit up with fireworks, which, together with popular songs, constituted one of the main attractions of the Piedigrotta festivities from 1835 on. Trained at the Naples Royal Institute of Fine Arts in the years of the radical artistic renewal launched by Domenico Morelli, Migliaro became an original interpreter of the Neapolitan spirit in his genre painting, producing works connected with Neapolitan landmarks and customs. These were joined at the end of the 19th century by exuberant scenes of merrymaking and engaging episodes in the life of common folk (for example The Tattoo, 1890,Pinacoteca della Provincia di Napoli), the style of which can also be seen in this work in the Cariplo Collection.