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Vittorio Matteo Corcos | Dreams / Sogni, 1896 | Art in Detail

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Title: Dreams
Description: The young lady is Elena Vecchi, a friend's daughter.
Date: 1896
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 160 × 135 cm
Current location: National Gallery of Modern and Contemporary Art in Rome.








Vittorio Matteo Corcos (1859-1933)🎨 returned in 1886 to Florence, where he painted the prominent and the fashionable portrait of a modern girl, Elena Vecchi, which has become the most emblematic image of the so-called Belle Epoque.
His most notorious portrait, however, was that of his mistress, Elena Vecchi, the daughter of a naval officer who carned his fame as Jack La Bolina, the author of popular adventure stories.
Dreams belongs to a long line of impressionist images of women reading, but the model is not interrupted with book in hand or disturbed in a moment of reverie. Instead the yellow Flammarion novels lie closed on the bench, while Vecchi gazes provocatively at the viewer.
Her crossed legs and indecorous pose were considered scandalous for the period, causing quite a stir when the painting was exhibited in Florence in 1896.
  • Literary suggestions
In the artistic climate that pervaded in Italy at the turn of 19th century, the subjects tackled by Corcos🎨 employed their engaging narrative to reflect the literary suggestions of French naturalism and symbolism; since the artist’s wife was fond of intellectual pursuits, she introduced him to the circle of the Marzocco, the newspaper that occupied the ground between Carducci’s solemn declamations, the intimate observatory of Pascoli’s Eternal Child and Gabriele d’Annunzio’s sumptuous study.









Il grande capolavoro Sogni, è l’opera più celebre di Vittorio Matteo Corcos (1859-1933)🎨, proveniente dalla Galleria d’Arte Moderna di Roma.
Si tratta del ritratto, davvero particolare per l’epoca, di una ragazza moderna, Elena Vecchi, figlia di un amico del pittore, Jack La Bolina (pseudonimo di Augusto Vecchi), ex ufficiale di Marina e scrittore di opere ispirate alla vita marinara, del quale Corcos🎨 eseguì nel 1897 un ritratto a figura intera. La giovane donna trascorse l'adolescenza presso la famiglia di Corcos, al quale fu sentimentalmente legata.
Grazie alla forza del gesto e dello sguardo, come alla suggestiva ambientazione, è diventato l’immagine più emblematica della cosiddetta Belle Époque, di cui ben rappresenta l’atmosfera sospesa tra i sogni dorati e una sottile inquietudine.
Esposto per la prima volta alla Festa dell’Arte e dei Fiori di Firenze 1896, il quadro aveva destato un "chiasso indiavolato" e provocato un acceso dibattito sul significato da attribuire a quell’intenso ritratto di giovane donna, ora definito "spiritualista" ora "realista", ma infine universalmente ammirato per l’originalità della composizione e l’inquieto carattere della protagonista.