Antonio Basoli

Painter of stage sets and perspective views. The son of a Bolognese painter, Basoli was a pupil under several masters. He worked with his brothers Luigi and Francesco and spent a short time at the Italian Theatre in St. Petersburg where he specialized in perspective and the design of sets. In 1810 and 1821 respectively he published his Raccolta di 50 Scene Teatrali and the Collezione di Varie Scene Teatrali. Many of the latter designs were made for La Scala in Milan where he succeeded Alessandro Sanquirico as the head stage set designer. The main source for his biography is the Cattalogo delle opere di Antonio Basoli scritto da lui medesimo l'anno 1821, a manuscript preserved at the Accademia Clementina in Bologna. (Peter Fuhring, Design into Art, Drawings for Architecture and Ornament, The Lodewijk Houthakker Collection, vol. 2, London, 1989, p.631)

Text © National Gallery of Art, 2020